
^ 



,+ 



/ 



\ 



/ 



I 



Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2011 with funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/tuscanstudiessl<eOOscot 



TUSCAN STUDIES 



AND 



SKETCHES 



LEADER SCOTT ^^ -^^^ K 



" A NOOK IN THE APENNINES," " MESSER AGNOLO'S HOUSEHOLD, 
"the RENAISSANCE OF ART IN ITALY" 



.^- 

^ 






1 

y ILLUSTRATED 



NEW YORK : 
SCRIBNER AND WELFORD. 

MDCCCI-XXXVII. 



J 



-^^u 



^x^^ 



}<f^ 



PREFACE. 




HERE is a certain ancient library in 
Florence, called the " Magliabecchiana," 
which is a delightful haunt for a book- 
worm. Here one can burrow among the 
black-letter tomes of the old chronicler, and there is no 
more amusing reading than the gossip of the old Flo- 
rentine writer. Here one can find all that past times 
have known on any Florentine subject, and hunt out 
the history of every old family and massive palace. On 
the floor above, the archives are preserved, and here 
the student may read the letters and documents of 
Florentine citizens, governors, artists, and authors for 



vi PREFACE. 

centuries back, and repeople the palaces as they were 
in ages gone by. 

It is among the worm-eaten old tomes of the 
Magliabecchiana library, and the MS. folios of the 
archives, that I have burrowed out, from the writing 
of many a dead hand, the story of some of our 
Florentine treasures. 

The sketches are from nature, and are scenes we 
have come across in rambling here and there in this 
delightful land — whose past is a glorious record, whose 
present is a beauty and a hope. 

Much of the matter is new to print; but I must beg 
to thank very heartily Messrs. Cassell and Co., for 
their kind permission to make use of Chapters I. and 
V. in Part I., which have appeared in " The Magazine 
of Art ; " also the Editor of " The Ladies' Trea- 
sury," who allows the reprint of Chapters III., V., 
and VIII. in the Second Part, and the Editor of 
"The Art Journal" for Chapter VII., Part I. 

LEADER SCOTT. 

Florence, 1887. 



CONTENTS 



PART L— STUDIES. 

CHAPi PAGE 

I. THE GIANTS AT THE GATES : I. DAVID ; 2. HERCULES ; 



3. NEPTUNE 
II. A LIBRARY OF CODICES 
III. OLD ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS 



II 
61 
81 



IV. FLORENTINE MOSAICS 



IIO 



V. THE BRIDES ROOM 



VI. A RECOVERED FRESCO 



VII. A MUSEUM OF PICTORIAL TAPESTRY 



127 

148 



CONTENTS. 



FART IL—SKETCHES. 

CHAP. PAGE 

I. A VINTAGE PARTY . . . . . l6l 

II, THE FESTIVAL OF THE DEAD . . . l8l 

III, AT THE BATHS ..... 193 

IV. THE GIOSTRA ..... ,217 
V. THE MUSHROOM MERCHANT IN THE APENNINES . 235 

VI. A MOUNTAIN FUNERAL .... 245 

VII. A FLORENTINE MARKET .... 253 

VIII. THE CASTLE OF BELCARO .... 269 

IX. VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS . . -275 

X. A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART . . . 306 




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



iS. 



SAN MiNiATO ..... Frontispiecc 

PAGE 

MICHAEL ANGELO'S DAVID . . . . 1 4 

HERCULES AND CACUS, BY BACCIO BANDINELLI . . 34 

PROPHET, BY BACCIO BANDINELLI, ON THE CHOIR IN THE 

DUOMO ...... 48 

LOGGIA DE' LANZI . . . . . -55 

SAN MARCO, FLORENCE ..... 60 

WITH THE NOVICES OF SAN MARCO . . . .66 

FROM DONATELLO'S ORGAN GALLERY, FORMERLY IN THE 

DUOMO OF FLORENCE .... 78 

LUCA DELLA ROBBIA'S GALLERY . . . -95 

SANVONAROLA PREACHING. .... 99 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



PAGE 

"cinque cento" chair . . . . . 128 

"a cinque cento" house decoration . . . 131 

SONG of SOLOMON, FLEMISH TAPESTRY . . . 150 

ITALIAN VINES . . . . . . 162 

FRENCH SYSTEM OF VINE GROWING . . . 1 69 

A FLORENTINE FLTNERAL . . . . 184 

THE WHITE MISERICORDIA PREPARING FOR A FUNERAL . 189 
ITALIAN BATHS . . . . . -194- 

THE COAST NEAR VIAREGGIO . . . . 197 

AN APENNINE VILLAGE . . . . . 2l6 

ROMAN COMEDIANS ..... 232 

WHERE THE MUSHROOMS GROW .... 236 

THE priest's visit ..... 244 

A MIGLIACCIO SELLER . . . . . . 265 

VILLAGE IN THE APENNINES ..... 274 

ST. GEMIGNANO . . . . . . ^ 308 



PART I. 

TUSCAN STUDIES. 



CHAPTER I. 




^be Giants at tbe (Bates. 

I.— DAVID. 

HRINED in the very heart of Florence is 
the ancient Palace of the Signory, with its 
Moorish cortile, its machicolated battle- 
ments, and airy bell-tower rising flower- 
like on its slender column. For many centuries these 
walls have sheltered the rulers of the city. During 
the Republic, Ghibelline and Guelph alternately held 
sway here. Mediaeval Gonfalonieri, with their train 
of Priors and Signory, gave way to the more despotic 
Ducal rule. In more modern days the Italian Parlia- 
ment was held there, and now it is merely a provincial 
municipality. And steadfast to their post, whatever 



14 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



may be the ruling power, the three colossi that guard 

the gates have stood 
firm and unchanging 
as rocks in a surging 
sea. Thus immutable 
through several stir- 
ring centuries, these 
giants, the David, ^ 
the Hercules, and the 
Neptune, have grown 
into the inmost heart 
of Florence, and be- 
come part of her story, 
and the piazza is like 
a house where death 
has left a vacant place^ 
since the removal of 
the David from its 
post. 

Taken as mere sta- 
tues, these colossi are 

' The David, at least, has 
seen many changes ; the 
other two were placed during 
the Ducal government. 

MICHAEL ANGELO's DAVID. 




THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 15 

only works which occupied a few years in the sculptors' 
lives, and a few pages in their memoirs, amongst man}^ 
other works perhaps more important ; but taken in a 
group, as signs of the times which produced them, 
they are a very significant trio. Scarcely fifty years 
elapsed between the commencement of the first and 
the completion of the last; but what a half-century of 
changes and revolutions it was ! When the David 
came into being, Florence was a town of flourishing 
burghers, whose complaisance had recently been 
shaken into religious fervour or obstinate disbelief by 
the fermentation of Savonarola's enthusiasm and his 
opponents' rage. What was more appropriate than 
that Michael Angelo, being called on for a great 
national work, should emblematize his city as a youth 
triumphing over a giant foe by the aid of Divine 
power ? 

Thirty years later, when the Hercules was placed as 
a pendant to the David, the Medici were again in 
supreme power. A Medici Pope (Leo X.) gave the 
order to Bandinelli, and he could think of no more 
appropriate emblem of his city than Hercules, the 
man-hero triumphing in his own power — a tribute to 
the irresistible sway of the proud dukes. Later still, 



1 6 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



when the Medici power and magnificence had reached 
their height, Florence came out from the hands of 
Ammanati emblematized, not only by human strength, 
but by that of a god commanding even the elements. 

Apart from these historical significations, it is also 
interesting to read in the two first statues the mind 
and character of the sculptors. Michael Angelo, 
greatest of artists, but still humble before the mighty 
grandeur of art itself — often abandoning his works un- 
finished because he could not give them the divinity 
his soul had conceived — chose as a subject a youth 
inspired with the divine spirit, and trusting not at all 
in his own power. Bandinelli, on the contrary, 
arrogant and self-asserting, chose the man-god 
Hercules, whose power was in himself, and did not 
come from an inspiration of divine art. The Neptune 
not being the independent choice of the sculptor, but 
taken merely as appropriate to a fountain, is not, like 
the others, emblematic of its maker. 

I propose, therefore, to follow these three giants 
into life, step by step, from the very marble quarries. 
The story of David is, I am aware, an oft-told tale : 
but in that, as in the two less known works, the 
account given in the life of the artist is but a small 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 17 

part 0)f the story of the statue, which enters into the 
biography of others besides its maker. 

In the Middle Ages, from the time when the 
building of the cathedral began, an institution existed 
in Florence, called the " Opera del Duomo," or, as it 
may be anglicized, " Company of Works of the Cathe- 
dral." This company consisted of all the famous 
architects, artists, and men of skill of the time ; and in 
a large building on the Piazza del Duomo they had 
studios for the sculptors, carvers, and decorators 
engaged in the building of the church. They super- 
intended the building, and were, besides, the great 
patrons of art in those days, most of the public 
works of art being the fruit of commissions given by 
them. 

On April 16, 1463, we find the Opera giving a 
commission to a certain " Agostino di Antonio di 
Ducci," sculptor, to make a giant similar to one 
standing above the door of the Church of the Servi — 
"or better," as the original document says — and for 
this they proposed to give him 321 lire (the lira of 
that time was worth 84 centimes, or 8d.).^ 

The books of the " House of Works of the Duomo " 

^ Stanziamenti dell' Opera, 1463. Gaye, ii. 466. 
2 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



contain also an entry on the 23rd of November, the 
same year, that " the giant made by Agostino di Ducci 
being finished in perfection, they paid him 265 lire, 
13 denari, being the remainder of the sum due to 
him." 

So pleased were they with this work, that in 1464, 
when a huge block of marble, of nine braccia long, had 
been excavated at Carrara, the Opera commissioned 
the same Agostino Ghucci, or Ducci, to make a figure 
^' in the form of a giant, in the name and place of a 
prophet " — I give a literal translation of the old docu- 
ment — " to place on a sprone, or buttress, of the 
Duomo, as the Company of Works should choose, 
the which figure he had promised to make in four 
pieces — that is to say, one piece the head and throat, 
two pieces the arms, and all the rest one piece." ^ 
This quaint commission is dated August 18, 1464. 
There is a question whether the " Arte della Lana " or 
the " Opera " gave the order ; but however it was, the 
figure was never finished. The very Fates forbade 
the birth of a giant whose head and arms were to be 
patched on ; and instead of poor Agostino earning 300 
florins by making a better statue than the former, his 
^ Gaye, ii. 467. 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 19 

bare expenses of a hundred florins were paid to him, 
and he was excluded from being one of the workmen 
for the Duomo. The block he had nearly spoiled lay 
useless among the marbles in the great courtyard of 
the works, and nobody either made or marred it for 
nearly forty years. Vasari says Simone di Fiesole 
w^orked at it — indeed, he gives him the credit of 
spoiling it ; but the documents we have mentioned 
prove without a doubt that Agostino was the culprit. 
It had once been offered to Donatello, but he, de- 
spising Agostino's inartistic chippings, refused the 
questionable honour. 

In 1500 Andrea Contucci del Monte Sansovino, 
a sculptor who had studied with Michael Angelo 
in his boyish days in the Medici gardens, returned 
to Florence from Portugal, and seeing the great 
stone, begged to have it. He would have pieced 
it out, but this the Opera objected to. Then 
Pier Soderini, the Gonfaloniere, offered to buy it 
to give to Leonardo da Vinci ; and while all 
this was going on, Michael Angelo came upon the 
scene. The manner of his coming is a doubtful ques- 
tion. Vasari says that his friends wrote to him in 
Rome to tell him that the marble was going begging, 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



and he who had long wished to obtain it came and 
made every effort to get the commission.' 

Grimm tells the story another way. He writes that^ 
on the request of Sansovino for the marble, the consuls 
of the Arte-Lana, not liking his scheme of piecing it 
out, wished to obtain Michael Angelo's opinion as to 
the possibility of his producing anything out of it him- 
self.2 He came, saw, and decided to conquer this 
stumbling-block. In the deformed giant he beheld 
the germs of the David which was afterwards tO' 
astonish the world. He had on hand a commission 
from Cardinal Piccolomini to execute fifteen small 
statues for a tomb in Siena Cathedral, but he gave up 
this profitable work on gaining the coveted order for 
the Florentine colossus. Here is the document, dated 
— " 1501. 16 August." ''The honourable (spectabiles) 
Company of the Wool Staplers (Artis Lanse) being 
assembled, together with the Company of Works, ia 
the audience chamber of said Opera, to deliberate on 
giving a work of sculpture which should reflect honour 
on the company, to a worthy master, herewith commis- 
sion Michael Angelo Ludovico Buonarroti, Florentine 

^ Vasari's " Lives of the Painters," vol. v. p. 240. 
'^ Grimm's " Life of Michael Angelo," vol. i. p. 202. 



THE GIANTS A T THE GA TES. 



citizen, to make and perfect a man called a giant, 
blocked out of a piece of marble nine braccia high 
[i7:f feet] existing in the said Opera, before com- 
menced by Master Agostino [here the surname is 
illegible from the damp], and badly commenced ; in 
the space of two years, from the proximate kalends of 
September, with the salary of six gold florins monthly ; 
the House of Works to furnish workmen, a suitable and 
commodious place, woodwork, and all other necessaries. 
The said statue finished, they will meet to consult if it 
merits a further price, and this is to be left to their 
consciences." ^ 

I do not know how far an artist of the present day 
would like to trust to the consciences of his patrons as 
to the price to be paid for his work, but the fifteenth 
and sixteenth centuries were the age of true art 
patronage, and sculptors worked for glory and not 
for a means of livelihood, Michael Angelo made a 
small model in wax, of David with a sling in his hand, 
as an emblem of the government then reigning, that as 
David had conquered in the power of the Lord, and 
ruled His people justly, so the Signoria, having 
vanquished their tyrants, should continue to govern 
^ Gaye's " Carteggia Inedita," vol. ii. p. 434. 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



wisely. A studio was enclosed around the marble, 
with planks and masonry, and here, on Monday 
morning, September 13, 1 501, he commenced to work 
in right earnest, although he had some days before 
given a few blows to the stone. ^ 

Here, then, for five months the great master spent 
his days, hewing and hammering the mis-shapen 
block. With him sculpture meant really carving from 
the living rock, as its name implies, not the mere 
modelling in clay, which is misnamed sculpture in the 
present day. Michael Angelo had no set of mechanics 
to copy his model by rule, line, and a multitude of 
pegs, and then send it forth to the world as sculptured 
{scolpito) by his own hand. No ! he worked in soli- 
tude, if that can be called solitude which is peopled by 
the spirits and thoughts of art and genius. He made 
no mechanical measurements and contrivances, but 
with his little wax model by his side and the giant 
form in his soul, he day by day transferred that form 
to the marble. That he worked with his whole heart 
and soul we know. He attacked the marble with such 
fury and impetus that it seemed he would break it to 
pieces ; one blow knocked off bits three or four fingers 
^ " Archives and Deliberations of Opera, 1496 to 1507." 



THE GIANTS A T THE GA TES. 23 

wide, but always true to the line ; in a quarter of an 
hour he hewed off more pieces than the stoutest stone- 
cutter could do in an hour. While engaged on any 
great work, Michael Angelo lived a most moderate 
life, " taking only a frugal refreshment at the close of 
his day's work. He slept very little, frequently rising 
in the night and resuming his labours with the chisel 
because he could not rest. For these occasions he 
had made himself a cap of pasteboard, in the centre of 
which he placed his candle, which thus gave him light 
without encumbering his hands. The candles were 
made of goat's tallow." ^ 

In this way the time passed till February 28, 1502, 
when, the work being half completed, Michael Angelo 
called together his patrons to judge of its merits, and 
they decreed to give him 400 florins in gold, the 
monthly salary, however, to be deducted. 

After this the work went on more slowly ; it was a 
time of great internal disturbance for Florence, the 
Medici again attempting to establish themselves, and 
Caesar Borgia also scheming to become possessed of 
the city. However, by the beginning of the year 
1504, the statue was almost completed, and an entry 
' Vasari, vol. v. p. 339. 



24 TUSCAN STUDIES. 

appears in the Archives of the Works of the Duomo, 
dated, " 1504, January 25. To call a meeting of all 
the well-known artists, and architects, and men of 
note, to take their opinions on the subject of a good 
site for it." 

And certainly the king among sculptors could have 
had no more worthy judges than the illustrious group 
of notabilities — many of their names as immortal as his 
own — who met in the audience chamber of the Works 
of the Duomo to do honour to Michael Angelo's 
" David." 

They sat in the atelier with the youthful giant, 
hitherto shrouded from mortal gaze, exposed to view 
in their midst ; and though many of them may have 
felt a natural envy in their hearts, none could find a 
word to say except in praise. There were Sansovino 
and Leonardo da Vinci, both of whom had tried to 
obtain the marble for themselves, and in the report 
of the meeting it is noticeable that the two spoke 
only very few words and were not warm in their 
admiration. 

All the famous artists of the day grouped around. 
There was old Cosimo Roselli and his son Piero, 
Andrea della Robbia, Francesco Granacci, — Michael 



THE GIANTS A T THE GA TES. 25 

Angelo's boyish friend and rival in the Medici 
Gardens, — Pietro Perugino, and Lorenzo di Credi, 
the great architects Giuliano and Antonio San Gallo, 
and many other men of standing in the city. 

Michael Angelo had his own choice after all, and 
the David was placed at the gate, a giant guardian 
who has stood at his post steadfastly for three 
centuries and a half, to be deposed at last, when in 
1873 the statue was removed to the Belle Arti, 

A month or two now sufficed to finish the work, 
and on the ist of April, 1504, Simone del Pollaiuolo 
was commissioned, in the presence of Michael Angelo, 
to conduct the marble statue to the palace before the 
25 th of the same month. 

This arrangement does not seem to have been 
carried out, for on the 30th of April, 1504, is a very 
severe order from the Signoria to the " Worshipful 
Company of the Works of the Duomo, that Simone 
del Pollaiuolo, Antonio di San Gallo, Bartolomeo, 
carpenter, and Bernardo, architect, are deputed by the 
before mentioned ' magnificent ' Signoria to conduct 
the giant which is in the House of Works to the 
Loggia of the Signoria by the end of May." ^ A few 
^ Gaye's " Carteggia," vol. ii. p. 463. 



26 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



days later the narrow streets of old Florence were 
filled with a busy crowd escorting the colossus to his 
abiding-place. 

On the 14th of May, the wall of the atelier having 
been broken down around the door to allow of its 
exit, the statue, which weighed 18,000 lbs., was drawn 
into the open air. Grimm — quoting Parenti's MS. 
" Storia Fiorentina " probably — says the scaffolding 
was devised by Cronaca. Vasari, who in this case 
happens to agree with the document we have quoted 
above, gives the brothers San Gallo the credit of it. 
The statue hung free by means of ropes in a huge 
framework of wood ; the frame was drawn slowly 
forward on oiled beams by means of pulleys, the 
united strength of forty men being required to move 
it. The first day's journey only accomplished a small 
part of the way, and it was left at nightfall alone in the 
unlighted streets. The successful artist must have 
had some envious rivals, for during the hours of 
darkness stones were thrown at it. The second 
night a watch was set, but the rival's partisans were 
not to be balked of their demonstrations, and attacked 
the watch while trying to injure the statue. Eight of 
them were, however, apprehended and imprisoned. 



THE GIANTS A T THE GA TES. 27 

On the 1 8th of May, 1504, at mid-day it reached the 
Piazza. The Judith of Donatello, which was thought 
to have a sinister effect on the fortunes of the city, 
was removed from its position on the Ringhiera of the 
palace, and the David took its vacant place. This, 
however, was not accomplished till the 8th of June 

How well we can imasfine the scene on the Piazza 
as the noble form rose erect in the sunlight and took 
its stand as one of the household gods of the Floren- 
tines ! From the day of its completion, the city 
reckoned her deliverance from three great enemies — ■ 
the two Borgias, and Piero di Medici, who was 
drowned in disputing the passage of the river at the 
battle of Garigliano. The Florentines also attributed 
to its beneficent influence the conquest of Pisa, which 
took place shortly after. As a work of art, the David 
is well worthy its position as a good genius. Vasari 
affirms that " it surpasses all others, ancient or 
modern," and that " he who has seen this, therefore, 
need not care to see any production besides, whether 
of our own time or those preceding it." When one 
reflects how the artist's ideal must have been cramped 
by working it down to a spoiled material, the freedom 
and power of the David are surprising. So closely 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



has he used the marble, that the marks of the chisel of 
Agostino still in a measure mar the head and the 
back of the shepherd-warrior. He stands in his 
full grace of large-limbed youth, his powerful limbs 
forming a curious contrast to the fresh boyish expres- 
sion of his face. Yet this contrast is a great triumph 
of art in adhering to nature. 

Grimm, after comparing Michael Angelo's style, 
formed by a study of nature rather than of ancient art, 
says (vol. ii. p. 129) that "in some unexpected manner 
he is even more true to nature than the more perfect 
Greek masters. The Greeks had formed an ideal 
scale for physical representation, according to which, 
certain periods of life were taken as the centre of fixed 
epochs, and were adhered to by the artists. There is in 
boys at three or four years old a time of shooting up 
when they grow thin and slender. I never have found 
this produced by Greek sculptors. Such periods of 
development and growth occur again after the vigorous 
boyish age ; this also they have passed over. And it 
is precisely this gaunt, long-limbed period of youth 
that Michael Angelo has shown in the David, . . . 
But QToinpf throuo^h the works of ancient art we find 
none that, as in the David, combines such a strong. 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 29 

almost thick head, with such a sHm and even slender 
figure, and lastly with such large hands and feet. 
Nature permits such a combination of contradictions. 
This very union of awkwardness and agility dis- 
tinguishes a certain age, and nothing could be more 
characteristic than Michael Angelo's David if he was, 
as the Bible describes him, at once a youth and a 
hero, a shepherd's boy, more dexterous than strong, 
like a horse which has not yet entirely lost the colt-like 
feeling in his limbs." 

Michael Angelo's fidelity to nature in contrast to 
the more eclectic style of Greek masters may be ex- 
plained by the fact that the Greeks aimed at the 
perfection of beauty, and therefore would not portray 
the human figure at the stage of imperfection or 
of incompleted beauty. They delighted in perfect 
infancy, perfect childhood, and perfect manhood, but 
ignored that transition stage at which childhood's grace 
has vanished and manly strength is yet incomplete. 
Michael Angelo had such faith in Nature's grandeur 
that he has ventured to represent her faithfully even 
at an immature point. 

It was while the David statue was standing still 
enclosed in its scaffolding that the oft-told incident of 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



the Gonfaloniere Soderini's pseudo-criticism took place. 
Poor Piero Soderini ! it is probable he is better known 
to posterity for this little bit of ignorant conceit than 
for all the good he did for his city during his long and 
difficult rule. 

On the nth of June another order was sent on 
behalf of the Government to the Opera, or House of 
Works, to make a base of marble for the statue, which 
was already placed at the door of the palace. While 
standing there in the first days of its public existence, 
it was covered with laudatory sonnets from the pens of 
all the artist's admirers and friends. Cellini says there 
were several hundreds of them. It was the fashion 
among the wits and poets of the age to pay their 
homage to genius in this manner. 

The Gonfaloniere was so pleased at the glory re- 
flected on the Signoria by such a masterpiece of art, 
that he ordered Michael Angelo to make a second 
David in bronze, to send to France as a present to 
the Marshal de Gies. The great artist soon after 
went to Rome, at the invitation of Pope Julius II,, who 
became his greatest patron in after years. 

The David led a peaceful life for eight years ; 
then came the fall of the Gonfaloniere Soderini and 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 31 

the recall of the Medici, who were brought back by- 
force of the Spanish troops under Cordova. Poor 
deposed Soderini rode away with his friends in the 
dark night of August 30, 151 2, and on the i6th of 
September a surging crowd filled the piazza around 
the David. Giuliano de Medici marched into the 
great hall and demanded his rights and restoration. 
The great bell was sounded, friends and enemies filled 
the square, the Signoria stood in angry state on the 
Ringhiera by David's side ; but their city's standard 
was in the hand of Giuliano de Medici, and the revo- 
lution ended by his assuming the government, the 
troops of foreign mercenaries which supported his 
cause proving too formidable for even the sturdy 
Florentine burghers. 

But though the David stood unscathed during the 
dangers of the first revolution it witnessed, it was not 
so fortunate in the second, which took place in 1527. 
The Medici were once more expelled ; a terrible fight 
raged before the Palazzo Vecchio, the party in posses- 
sion defending it against the intruders. One of the be- 
sieged cast a heavy missile (a bench or form) down from 
the battlements on the heads of the party who were try- 
ing to force an entrance, but the unwieldy mass fell in- 



32 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



stead on the uplifted arm of David and broke it in three 
pieces. The fragments lay unheeded on the ground 
for two turbulent days, no one heeding the fracture of 
a piece of still life, however beautiful, while so much 
human blood was being shed around. But two boys 
came to the rescue, Francesco Salviati from his 
windows, seeing the precious fragments trampled under 
the feet of the insurgents, ran to call his friend Georgio 
Vasari, then a boy of his own age (about fifteen or six- 
teen), and the two daring youths made their way into 
the piazza, rescued the broken bits from beneath the 
very feet of the soldiers, and carried them off to the 
house of Michel Agnolo de Rossi, a weaver of velvets, 
and father of the painter Salviati. For years the 
good genius of the city stood mutilated before the 
palace gate, but when at length Duke Cosimo came 
into power, he regained the fragments and had them 
attached by means of copper nails. Since that time 
the David has stood uninjured in the midst of wars and 
revolutions, till a few years ago (1873) it was removed 
to the Gallery of the Belle Arti, the fears which 
Antonio S. Gallo had expressed 360 years ago as to 
the danger of exposing so tender a marble to the air 
having again arisen in the minds of the modern 



THE GIANTS A T THE GA TES. 33. 

Florentines. The ceremony of removal took some 
days. A huge wooden car and a temporary tramway 
were constructed, the wall of the Belle Arti being 
opened to receive it, just as in the old days that of the 
studio had been broken to admit of its exit. 

It has a handsome tribune built for its reception, 
and well sheltered from outer storm may yet last many 
centuries ; but in the hearts of the Florentines the 
vacant place at the gates awakes a sigh, and the very 
piazza seems to have lost a little of its life. The 
Hercules stands alone as giant guardian of the ancient 
gate, and the symmetry of the entrance now seems 
lost. 

II.— HERCULES. 

The David had stood for four years a solitary 
giant guardian at the doors of the palace of the 
Signoria, and the good burghers of Florence had 
begun to reckon their family events by its advent, and 
to say such a thing happened "before the giant came," 
or " it was just a year after the giant was put up ; " 
when Pier Soderini, the Gonfaloniere, having heard 
that a huofe block of marble had been excavated at 
Carrara, conceived the brilliant idea of setting a 

3 



34 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



second gigantic figure on the other side of the en- 
trance. On the loth 
of May, 1508, there- 
fore, he wrote the fol- 
lowing letter to the 
Marquis of Massa, 
Alberigo Malaspina, 
the owner of the 
quarries : — " To the 
Marquis Alberigo. If 
you can do so without 
inconvenience to your 
lordship, we should be 
grateful if you would 
keep that marble for 
us, as we wish to 
::^ make a statue to adorn 
the piazza in this city, 
and by this your lord- 
ship will be able to 
gratify all the Floren- 
tine people." ^ 

HERCULES AND CACUS, BY BACCIO BANDINELLI. Q)X\ the Ztth of SeO- 

^ Lettere alia Signoria. Gaye, " Carteggio Inedito," vol. ii. p. 97. 




THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 35 

tember, in the same year, Soderini again writes 
to the Marquis of Massa, saying that he has under- 
stood from Raphael of Reggio that the marquis is 
anxious to have the block removed, and that as soon 
as Michael Angelo comes to Florence he will send him 
to Carrara to diminish the marble, that it may be more 
easily carried. ^ 

But it seems that Michael Angelo was not at this 
time at the disposal of the Gonfaloniere ; for another 
letter from him, dated Florence, i6th December, 1508, 
makes excuses for the artist's not having yet gone to 
Massa to block out the statue, saying that the Pope had 
only allowed him twenty-five days in Florence (when 
he came to finish the bronze David for the Marshal de 
Gies), and adding, "There is no man in Italy capable 
of preparing the marble but the artist himself, for 
another man not knowing his design might spoil it. 
Therefore," says Soderini, " till he comes, which we 
hope may be soon, we can satisfy neither your lord- 
ship nor ourselves." ^ 

Michael Angelo's idea was to make a colossal 

' Lettere alia Signoria. Gaye, " Carteggio Inedito," vol. ii. p. 97. 
^ Gaye, "Carteggio Inedito," vol. ii. p. 107. Manni, " Sui 
Sigilli Antichi," vol. i. p. 38. 



36 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



Hercules slaying Cacus, the width of the block at its 
base lending itself well to the introduction of a pros- 
trate figure, and he had, in preparation, made a design 
and small model of his conception. The subject was 
well chosen ; the figure of Hercules, being the sign of 
the seal of the Republic, could also be taken as an 
emblem of the power of Florence in triumphing over 
her enemies. The Judith, by Donatello, and the 
David, were also, as we have already said, emblem- 
atical of the same power, and each was eloquent of 
the times in which it was created. 

Michael Angelo's design for this statue is still extant 
in the South Kensington Museum ; it is, although 
only a small sketch, very powerful, the two figures 
being coiled together, the one in victorious power, the 
other in writhing defeat. 

Stirring events, however, befell Florence. During 
these tempestuous times Michael Angelo was at work 
at Bologna and at Rome, seldom visiting Florence, 
Then came the return of the Medici, with the Spanish 
army to assist at their restoration ; and Pier Soderini 
was compelled to resign. The Medici, with one of 
their family in the Papal Chair as Leo X., held sway 
with all their former power and more than their former 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. yj 

arrogance. And during all these exciting times Her- 
cules was still lying a useless block of marble at 
Carrara, but not forgotten. The sculptor Baccio Ban- 
dinelli had cast longing eyes on it, and, being endowed 
with more ambition and vanity than genius — though 
he possessed talent of a certain kind — felt within him- 
self that if he only had the marble and the opportunity 
he could produce a work which would throw Michael 
Angelo's David into the shade, and prove more than 
worthy of being placed as a pendant thereto. More- 
over, he would eclipse the great sculptor on his own 
ground by choosing the selfsame design. Hercules and 
Cacus was a subject quite familiar to him, for in his 
early youth, when his father, proud of his talent, gave 
him a studio, and had some marbles brought for him, 
one of his earliest efforts was a group, five feet high, 
of Hercules standing over the dead body of his foe. 

In 1515, when Leo X. made his triumphal entry 
into his native city, Bandinelli seized the opportunity 
of showing the Medici that a second Michael Angelo 
was at their service, by placing a colossal model of 
Hercules, in clay, under one of the arches of the Loggia 
on the Grand Piazza, as one of the adornments of the 
Papal triumph. Time went on, and still the block was 



38 TUSCAN STUDIES. 

lying at Carrara. Leo X. died; Clement VII. was 
elected, and by him Michael Angelo was employed on 
the tombs of the Medici in San Lorenzo. In 1525 
the Commune of Florence again bethought itself of the 
large block of marble which Pier Soderini had bought 
seventeen years before, and would have employed 
Michael Angelo, as had been first intended. But the 
Fates were against him in this matter. He had in 
some way made an enemy of Bandinelli's friend 
Domenico Boninsegni, the superintendent of the works 
for the facade of San Lorenzo, and he, as a matter of 
revenge, used all his influence with the Pope to give 
the marble to Bandinelli, representing to His Holiness 
that if such a large work were given to Michael 
Angelo the works for the facade and chapel of the 
Medici would have to be neglected. He, besides, 
cunningly suggested that by employing two rivals in 
art, the spirit of emulation would make them produce 
better works. ^ 

This is Vasari's account ; and a document, cited by 

Gaye from the "Ricordi di Firenze Riccardiana," though 

making no personal mention of Boninsegni, agrees in 

fact with it. It says that "on the 20th of July, 1525, 

^ Vasari, vol. iv. pp. 247, 248 (Milanesi's edition). 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 39 

the Commune of Florence had a piece of marble brought 
from Carrara, nine braccia high and four and a half 
broad at the base, to make a figure to put on the piazza, 
and having in Florence one M. Angelo, the best master 
of sculpture in the world, the people desired that he 
should work it, he having been so successful in the 
David, and that from a marble mutilated by other 
hands. But he being employed in the tombs of the 
Medici for Pope Clement, the said Pope intended that 
another Florentine sculptor should undertake it, that 
the sepulchres should not be left incomplete." Ban- 
dinelli, therefore, was sent to Carrara to diminish the 
marble according to his design, and it was brought to 
Florence in the month of July. 

It maybe imagined how mortifying this decision was 
to Michael Angelo, for a rivalry which amounted to 
antagonism had for years existed between the two 
artists. Indeed, some had said that spiteful injury to 
the cartoon of Michael Angelo while it hung in the 
Papal Hall was due to the enmity of Bandinelli. He 
was not of a character to let such a triumph go by 
unvaunted, and it is most likely that the great spirit 
of the higher genius was much vexed at this time by 
the self-laudation of the lower artist. 



40 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



The entrance of the Hercules into the world com- 
menced with a baptism, for as it was being drawn on 
shore at Signa, having been brought so far up the 
Arno, the block in some manner slipped from the hold- 
ings and fell heavily into the river, where its own 
weight soon buried it in the alluvial mud. Many means 
were tried to recover it, but in vain ; it refused to be 
rescued. We may well imagine Baccio Bandinelli's 
state of mind at this stone — which was to have made 
a great step to fame for him — thus sliding from him, 
especially as the wits of the day seized the incident as 
a good subject for their satires. Verses in Italian and 
Latin were poured forth. One sonnet by Giovanni 
Negretti was especially admired, in which the poet said 
that the marble, in its despair at the idea of being 
chipped by a bungler, had flung itself into the Arno. 

But the Pope had given his command that the stone 
was to be drawn forth, and such a command must be 
obeyed. The superintendents cast their eyes about 
them, and at last begged the aid of Pietro Rosselli, an 
ingenious builder, who forthwith started for Signa, 
where he turned the course of the stream, and laid the 
very banks low. At last, by levers and windlasses, the 
marble was brought on dry land, and thence, by means 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 41 

of beams placed lengthwise, it was rolled slowly on its 
toilsome way to Florence. 

Whilst it was still on the road, Baccio made the dis- 
covery that the design he had showed to the Pope would 
not fit the dimensions of the marble. This was the 
more annoying, as the wax model had especially pleased 
His Holiness, being full of muscular power and life. 
But the sculptor's genius had expanded beyond the 
dimensions of his material, and, much mortified, he set 
to work to make other designs. Alas ! a Pegasus with 
his wings clipped cannot soar. None of the models 
were equal to the first ; they came out one after the 
other stiff and lifeless. The Pope chose the best among 
them, and as soon as the block of marble had arrived 
at the House of Works for the Duomo, and been there 
raised on end in the courtyard, Bandinelli set to work. 
He first made a model in clay of equal size, which, 
however, every one concurred in condemning as 
greatly inferior in merit to the first small model, and 
as wanting in animation. 

The clay model finished, Baccio began to block out 
the lower limbs, when lo ! before they were even 
fashioned, the face of the times changed again. Rome 
was sacked, and Florence revolted ; the Medici were 



42 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



again driven out. Baccio, having private quarrels 
of his own, and fearing for his life in the absence of 
his patrons, buried his treasures in the garden of his 
villa, and fled to Lucca, leaving his Hercules barely 
blocked out in the House of the Works of the DuomOi 

The republican government, with whom Michael 
Angelo went heart and soul, and on whose behalf he 
became warrior and built fortifications during the siege^ 
could think of no better recognition of his services than 
to award to him once more the gigantic block which 
had eluded his grasp twice already. The decree of the 
Signoria giving it to him is dated August 22, 1528, 
and concedes the aforesaid block to Michael Angelo 
Buonarotti, " who should carve out and make therein 
one or more figures, as shall please the said Michael 
Angelo, to be placed in the position which this Signoria 
shall decide."^ 

He intended to give up the subject of Hercules, 
and make a Samson with one or two Philistines under 
his feet. 

Public affairs, however, allowed the great master no 
time for sculpture. The armies of the Prince of Orange 
and the " Palleschi " allies were crowding the hills 

^ Gaye, vol. ii. p. 98. 



THE GIANTS A T THE GA TES. 43 

around Florence. Michael Angelo threw away the 
scalpel for more potent weapons, and flung himself 
into the defence of his beloved San Miniato. No 
sooner, however, was peace concluded than the Pope^ 
Clement VII., resuming his former authority, bade 
Michael Angelo finish his works in the chapel of the 
Medici at San Lorenzi, and, ignoring the pompous 
decree of the Signoria, set Baccio Bandinelli to work 
again on the giant. 

While he was engaged in this, Baccio had apart- 
ments in the Medici Palace, but used the hospitality so 
badly as to become a spy, writing to Pope Clement of 
all the doings and sayings of the inmates of the palace. 
By this behaviour he made an enemy of Duke Ales- 
sandro, who threw every impediment in the way of his 
employment. Baccio, however, having a pope to back 
him, was not to be defeated by a duke. He betook 
himself to His Holiness, who came to meet Charles V. 
at Bologna, and carrying some presents (a relief in 
bronze and a medal with the Pope's likeness), made 
such good use of his opportunity, that, before he left, 
His Holiness promised to exert his authority with 
the duke to allow Bandinelli to finish his Hercules. 

The triumphant Baccio returned to Florence with 



44 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



lOO gold florins of the Pope's money in his pocket, and 
a letter intimating to the duke that he must be allowed 
to complete the giant. The permission could not be 
refused. He how set to work in earnest, and, allowing 
no hand but his own to touch the figure, he was so 
industrious that by the year 1534 it was finished.^ 
Even this time his design would not fit, for the foot of 
Cacus had to be pieced out. The Duke Alessandro, 
who seemed determined to do as little as he possibly 
could, let the statue remain unheeded, till Baccio, again 
appealing to his patron in Rome, Pope Clement, ob- 
tained from him a second letter to the duke, asking 
him to supply the means for erecting the statue in the 
piazza, as he was desirous that the sculptor should 
proceed to Rome as soon as it was done, to com- 
mence two tombs, for himself and the late Pope Leo X. 

Accordingly the space intended for it was closed in 
with planks, and the pedestal erected. The pedestal 
is not very artistic ; it only contains an inscription to 
Pope Clement, and the busts in relief of that Pope and 
Duke Alessandro. 

Cavaliere Settimani, in his " Memorie Florentine 
Inedite," gives the following account of the erection of 

' Vasari, " Life of Bandinelli." 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 45 

the giant : — " On May ist, 1534, Baccio of Mlchelag- 
nolo, goldsmith, Florentine, having in the Opera di 
S. Maria del Fiore made a statue of Hercules slaying 
Cacus, the said statue, standing thus upright and 
finished in the said House of Works, was drawn in 
three days, by means of beams and pulleys, into the 
piazza, and in the said day was seen placed on the 
corner of the steps of the palace towards the Loggie 
dei Signori. The block of marble of which the statue 
was made was one of the finest that ever came into 
Florence, but on the other hand one of the worst 
worked, in the judgment of men wise in sculpture." 

The two famous architects, Baccio d'Agnolo and 
Antonio da San Gallo, undertook the care of its re- 
moval and placing. 

Like the David, too, Hercules was covered with 
papers of verses ; but, alas ! instead of eulogiums they 
were all satires. One said that if Hercules' head 
were shaved there would not be a cranium large 
enough to hold his brains, and that his face was as 
much like a lion or a bull as that of a man. Others 
compared the torso to a sack of water-melons put on 
end. Some said the legs were so badly set that one 
could not tell on which of them Hercules was stand- 



46 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



ing, and if he were standing on both he ought to be 
falling down. Others declared that the foot seemed 
to have a fire under it. Benvenuto CelHni, in the 
course of a quarrel with Bandinelli at the Medici 
Palace, coolly quotes all these expressions of public 
opinion, and when the angry Baccio asks him what 
fault he can find with his design, Cellini answers that 
he has not seen it, but that as one who designs well 
must needs execute well, he imagines that the design 
is equal to the statue.^ 

Against these criticisms we may place that of 
Michael Angelo, who, when a cast of the head of 
Cacus was sent him, admitted that it was a good 
artistic work, but said he would like to see the whole 
statue. And we have also the testimony of Vasari, 
who, with subtle justice, writes : "Had that artist 
received from nature an amount of grace and facility 
equal to the labour and pains which he was ever ready 
to impose on himself, he would certainly have been 
entirely perfect in the art of sculpture." ^ 

Even adverse criticism could not discourage Bandi- 



" Vita di Benvenuto Cellini," Lib. ii. No. 70. 
Vasari, vol. iv. p. 258. 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 47 

nellf from an attempt to reach perfection, for on seeing 
the giant placed in the full light of day, he recognized 
defects in it himself, and having it re-enclosed with 
planks, gave the finishing touches, by bringing out 
the muscles more forcibly. The Duke Alessandro in 
person took means to silence the scoffs of the popu- 
lace, by imprisoning the authors of the worst satires, 
under the plea that the insult was to himself as the 
possessor of the statue. On the day in which it was 
uncovered, Baccio, not daring himself to face public 
criticism, sent a friend to hear what was said, and, as 
might be expected, abused him when he brought back 
such scanty praise. 

His patron, Pope Clement, showed himself more 
appreciative than the sturdy Florentines, for he gave 
Baccio an estate near his own villa of Pinzerimonte as 
a present, besides the payment he had agreed. He 
was besides made a Cavaliere or Knight of the Order 
of S. Jacopo. So he departed to Bologna to continue 
a colossal statue of Prince Doria, for which he had 
already received half payment, and Hercules was left 
to stand for centuries, unmoved by public opinion. 



4S 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



III.— THE NEPTUNE. 



It was in the time of Cosmo I., when artistic Florence 

was set in a ferment by the 
rumour of a third block of 
the finest marble, about twenty 
feet by ten, having been ex- 
cavated at Carrara. What 
were not the potentialities of 
such a block ! Each of the 
many sculptors who thronged 
the court of Duke Cosmo felt 
the powers of a second 
Michael Angelo awake with- 
in him : it might be his high 
destiny to create a colossus 
whose fame should surpass 
that of the " David," and 
certainly throw Bandinelli's 
"Hercules" into the shade. 
ii)iiiiiiiiii|iimn,mii,n,iiiimiifiM.Miiiiiiiini| ximes were no longer as 

PROPHET,BVBACCIOBANDINELLI, ^J^ J^^ ^^ J^en thOSe 

ON THE CHOIR IN THE DUOMO. »-^-'^; ^*" 

two artists were rivals for public commissions. Then, 
it was well known, that if the commune had the power,, 




THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 49 

Michael Angelo got the order ; and if it depended on the 
Pope, he gave it to BandinelH. But since that time 
all was changed ; the court of Cosmo was filled with 
a crowd of artists. There were Gianbologna, Mos- 
chino of Pisa, Baccio BandinelH, Vincenzio Rossi, 
Vincenzio Danti, Benvenuto Cellini, and Bartolommeo 
Ammannati, all eager to win this potential piece of 
marble. 

BandinelH was first on the scene. He went to 
Carrara in 1554 to see the block, and forthwith tried 
to secure it for himself by giving the owner of the 
quarry a certain sum as " caparra " (or earnest-money) 
to keep the marble for him. After which he returned 
to Florence to induce his patrons, the duke and duchess, 
to buy it. Now the duke desired to place a splendid 
fountain on his piazza, and thought this marble would 
come in well for a central statue, perhaps of Neptune. 
Baccio from time to time showed different models to 
the duke, but no settled commission was given even in 
1559, for in that year the owner of the quarries wrote 
to say that unless the purchase were completed he must 
cut up the piece into smaller blocks, for which he had 
great demand. Accordingly Vasari, the duke's artistic 
factotum, was despatched to pay for the marble, and 



50 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



send it to Florence. Bandlnelli, to facilitate its trans- 
port, chiselled off the superfluities according to his own 
design, and thus rendered it difficult for any other 
artist to make use of it. 

This huge mass was slowly being conveved up the 
Arno on a raft, when Benvenuto Cellini happened to 
see it as he went to Poggio a Cajano, and so grieved 
was he to think of the " povero malfortunato marmo " 
falling into the hands of his rival and enemy, that 
he determined to come to its rescue by getting it for 
himself He took its measure, and hurrying back to 
Florence, made several small models, which he took to 
the ducal villa at Poggio a Cajano, to commence his 
siege on the reigning powers, and oust Bandinelli 
from his " post of 'vantage." He found the illustrious 
family at table, and being admitted, in accordance 
with the duke's easy familiarity with artists, forthwith 
plunged into the subject, telling them of the height of 
excellence to which the Medici had raised the Floren- 
tine school of art, and the great responsibility that 
rested on Duke Cosmo's shoulders to keep it up to the 
mark, and how very unfair it would be to other artists 
of genius if such a piece of marble were given to the 
man who had spoiled Michael Angelo's great design by 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 51 

making a patched-up " Hercules " out of his splendid 
marble, and this without giving others a chance to 
display their talent, &c., &c. He ended at length 
with a proposal that the duke should allow all the 
sculptors to compete for the commission, each making 
a large model, the duke himself to be judge of their 
respective merits. He added slily, " Even if your 
excellency has made up your mind to give it to Bandi- 
nelli, a little competition will do no harm ; it will only 
make him put his best work into his model." The 
duke was rather pleased with the idea, and the " gara 
dei scultori " was decreed. But the duchess shook her 
head angrily as Cellini left her presence, and made up 
her mind decidedly that Bandinelli should not be 
ousted. Now began the great contest : the duchess 
and Bandinelli against five other sculptors, the duke 
alone and neutral. 

Benvenuto, knowing that he had a strong opponent 
in the duchess, set himself to propitiate her. He had 
made a very beautiful crucifix in white and black 
marble ; and one day he presented himself to her 
excellency, telling her of his work, its great beauty, 
and the expense it had been to him, adding that though 
he prized it too much to sell it at any price, he would 



52 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



make her a magnanimous present of it if she would 
promise neither to favour nor to oppose him in the 
competition. 

WomanHke, the duchess took umbrage at this 
strange request, and said, " Then you esteem neither 
my assistance nor opposition ? " 

"You see that I value them," replied Cellini, "for 
have I not offered you a gift that I esteem worth 2,000 
ducats ? All I want is that you give my talent and 
skill a fair chance of gaining the prize." 

The duchess rose and quitted the room in great 
disdain. 

Meanwhile Bandinelli sent to Rome for his friend 
Vincenzio de Rossi to come and help him, for he felt 
himself secure of the commission. But even to him 
came that proverbial " slip between the cup and the 
lip." While all these hopeful preparations were going 
on he was in reality working at his own tomb, and 
what is strange, his rivalry to Michael Angelo was the 
remote cause of his death. That great artist had in 
hand a beautiful " Pieta," which he designed to have 
placed on his tomb when he should die. (It is now 
behind the high altar in the Duomo.) Bandinelli, not 
to be outdone, decided to sculpture a " Pieta " for 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 53 

himself, but could not for a long time find a site to 
please him in any of the churches. At length a place 
was accorded him in the church of the Servites 
(Santissima Annunziata), in the chapel of the Pazzi 
famil}^ but with the proviso that none of their arms 
and devices were to be moved. The same care was 
not taken, however, to preserve the ashes of the 
unknown dead, for Gaye gives a letter from Lelio 
Torelli to Cosmo I., telling how Baccio wanted to 
remove the tomb of a soldier to make room for his 
" Pieta," and adding that there was no one living to 
object to this removal. 

The site given, Bandinelli with feverish haste had 
the sepulchre made, the " Pieta " placed on it, and then 
brought hither the bones of his father ; and now, his 
tomb being ready, he went home as though he knew 
his hour was come, and after an eight days' illness he 
died ! Cellini declares it was of despair at knowing 
the great marble was lost to him. Vasari says he 
over-exerted himself in working at the tomb, and that 
his great emotion in moving the remains of his father 
and placing them with his own hands tried his system 
too severely. Modern science, allowing the same 
cause, would probably call the malady " blood poison- 



54 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



ing " or " typhoid." Whatever was the reason, poor 
Baccio was removed from the strife for the great 
marble ; and, their most formidable rival gone, the 
other sculptors rushed forward to the contest more 
eagerly than ever. Benvenuto besieged the duke 
boldly with his models. Ammannati, with less direct 
tactics, set in order a train of mediators, beginning 
with Georgio Vasari, and reaching the duke at last. 
Vasari should take Ammannati's model to Rome, 
where he was going with Cardinal Medici, son of 
Cosmo I. There he should obtain Michael Angelo's 
approval and recommendation, through which Irresis- 
tible power the duke was to be moved to give him the 
marble. The stratagem succeeded so well that Cosmo 
I. ordered a large studio to be made under the Loggia 
de' Lanzi for Bartolommeo Ammannati. To this he 
was doubtless urged also by the duchess, who had been 
heard to declare " that she had helped Bandinelli 
living, and she would help him dead, insomuch that 
with her consent the marble should never fall into the 
hands of Cellini." 

Now was the furious soul of Benvenuto wrath within 
him, and hearing of the concession granted to Amman- 
nati, he forthwith rushed to the duke at Pisa, and 



56 TrSC.4.y STCD/ES. 

wrung from him the permission to enclose a similar 
studio for himself in the Loggia de" Lanzi. That 
building was accordingly boarded up and divided into 
two ; the duke provided clay, wood, and workmen. 
The twin studios were placed back to back, and were 
jealously guarded, that the occupant of the one should 
not see what went on in the other, and whilst they 
worked with ardour, new combatants came to the fray. 
Gianbologna or Jean Boulogne, the Fleming, after- 
wards more famous than any of the others, was at that 
time a young artist employed by Cosmo's son, Don 
Francesco, who is better known in story as the husband 
of Bianca Capello. Don Francesco gave his proh'g^ 
permission to make a model in competition, and a 
studio was prepared for him in the cloisters of Santa 
Croce. Another scion of the ducal house, Messer 
Ottaviano de' Medici, brought forward a protdg^, 
named Vincenzio Danti, a Perugian, and gave him a 
room in his own house wherein to prepare a model. 
Whether Rossi would have been faithful to the 
interests of his employer Bandinelli had he lived is 
not known, but that he tried to obtain the commission 
after his death is certain. Gaye gives a letter to 
Cosmo dated 1560, in which \"incenzio Rossi says " that 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 57 

if his excellency would only look at his colossal 
' Theseus ' he would not be deceived into giving the 
work to any one else." 

One day when the two principal models were well 
blocked out and only required finishing, Georgio Vasari 
took the duke to see that of Ammannati, which he 
(Vasari) had been helping to forward for some time. 
The duke orave full attention to the model but withheld 
his opinion, and telling one of his suite, a certain Messer 
Gianstefano, to go and see if Cellini's model was 
sufficiently advanced for him to see, he passed into the 
other studio, expressing himself much pleased also 
with the design of Benvenuto, who from that moment 
felt himself sure of winning. But just at this time he 
fell among traitors at Vicchio, where he had bought 
some land, and in the house of a certain Sbietta had 
poison given him in a sauce at supper. Returning to 
Florence, he worked one day at his giant and then took 
to his bed. This was the breach at which the duchess 
entered victorious. Under the plea that Cellini was 
ill, she induced the duke to give the order for the 
"Neptune" to Ammannati, who, in his selfish triumph, 
was the first to let his rival know of his success. So 
Cellini remained in his bed, and it took two doctors six 



58 TUSCAN STUDIES. 

months to eradicate the poison from his system ; how 
long the poison of envy rankled in his mind there is 
nothing to show, but he always spoke of the "poor 
unfortunate marble " having fallen from bad hands into 
worse. He had not forgotten it even in 1570, for in a 
letter to the duke claiming 1,500 scudi payment for 
the very crucifix which he had offered the duchess as 
a present, he reminds his excellency of his broken 
promise regarding the commission for the " Neptune." 
Ammannati, being left master of the field, applied 
himself earnestly to the work of the fountain with such 
despatch, that the government began to bestir them- 
selves to prepare a site for it. For this purpose, on 
the I St of March, 1563, the lion or marzocco was 
moved from the left-hand corner to the centre of the 
Ringhlera of the Palazzo Vecchio, and that part of the 
Ringhiera which projected on the left was levelled, the 
foundations of the fountain and the base for the 
" Neptune" in the centre being placed on that spot. 
The marble basin and statues were not, however, 
erected till 1571. The gigantic figure of Neptune, 
familiarly called by the Florentines " // Biancone,'' 
rises to the height of ten braccia ; he stands on his 
car drawn by four sea-horses of different coloured 



THE GIANTS AT THE GATES. 59 

marbles, three Tritons are at his feet. The basin is 
octangular, and is adorned with bronze figures of 
marine deities and satyrs, very finely modelled. The 
water was brougi^ht from the fount of Genevra, a mile 
out of Florence. The statue of Neptune has been 
severely criticised, and it is true there is some incon- 
gruity between the size of the colossus and the utter 
want of strength and power in his face and figure. 
Some blame may be given to Bandinelli, who cut down 
the marble in the first instance so as to make it more 
easy of transport, but so carelessly as to cramp any 
subsequent design. Whatever its faults, the Neptune 
has become as much of a household god to the 
modern Florentine, as the David was to his cinque 
cento ancestor. If he is away from Florence for any 
length of time, he will probably sigh, " Oi ! oi ! mi 
pare mille anni di revedere il Biancone " (" Oh dear ! 
it seems a thousand years till I see the great white 
statue again ! "). 



CHAPTER II. 

H Xibrar^ of Cobices- 




LIBRARY of 6,000 Codices! The very 
thought is suggestive of the enthusiasm 
of book-hunters before the age of printed 
books. How many pilgrimages must 
have been undertaken to far-off convents and 
churches ! How many long hours must the eager 
students have employed in copying them ! How 
many lily-branded gold florins must have been spent 
to obtain them ! And how much more precious than 
florins were they to their possessors ! Of course 
the 6,000 were not collected by one man, nor even in 
one age. The Laurentian Library of Florence, as it 



62 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



now stands, is a conglomerate growth of four cen- 
turies, but two names stand out in history as the 
founders of its nucleus : Cosimo di Medici, pater 
patricE, and Nicolao Nicoli, whose bequest was the 
beginning of the Libreria Medicea Pubblica, at San 
Marco. In later days these two collections were 
united, and, with the addition of others, were placed 
in the beautiful library which Michael Angelo de- 
signed and Vasari executed, to be a treasure to all 
future students. 

The story begins with that purest type of a 
Florentine scholar and humanist, Nicolao Nicoli. 
His father was, like most burghers, a rich merchant, 
and would have made his four sons follow his business ; 
but Nicolao — who had been a scholar in the Greek 
school of Emanuelo Grisolora, and studied philosophy 
and theology under Luigi Marsigli — gave his mind to 
higher things ; and when, on his father's death, he 
obtained his share of inheritance, Nicolao chose his 
own course of life — that of letters. His theological 
studies had counteracted, in a great measure, the human- 
izing effect of the classics, and Nicolao remained all 
his life a Christian in the highest sense of the word. 

An eager bibliophile, he collected, bought, and 



A 'LIBRARY OF CODICES. 63 

copied books wherever he could hear of them ; and a 
proud and happy man was he one day, when Leonardo 
Bruni sent him a present of a Cicero copied by himself 
But, unlike most bookworms, he was as willing to lend 
his treasures as to enjoy them himself, and at his 
death a list of 200 volumes was found to have been 
lent to different people. He encouraged studious 
youths to come and read at his house, and gave them 
valuable assistance by his learned explanations. His 
" Amrnianus Marcellinus " was written out in his 
own hand. The "Orator" and "Brutus" were 
brought to him from Lombardy by the ambassadors 
of Duke Filippo Visconti, when they came to demand 
peace in the time of Pope Martin. Nicolao heard 
that a complete edition of Pliny existed at Lubeck, 
and induced Cosimo dei Medici to send and obtain 
it ; and if any Florentine went to the East or to 
Greece, Nicolao would give him a list of authors 
which were not in Florence, that he should seek them. 
Indeed, his services to literature were many and great. 
It was he who kept alive Cosimo's interest in the 
classics, and his influence which made Fra Ambrogio 
and Carlo d'Arezzo what they were. 

A learned quartette used to meet almost every day 



64 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



at the convent of the Agnoli, in the room of Fra 
Ambrogio ; they were Nicolao, Ser Filippo, Maestro 
Pagolo (Paolo), and Cosimo dei Medici. Ser Filippo 
was the adopted son of a notary, Ser Ugolino, and by 
his learning he had risen to be one of the chief men in 
Florence, and was member of the Signoria. Although 
he never let a law pass that was not for the universal 
good of the city, yet, he found time, in the midst of 
public works, to hold learned converse with his friends, 
and to explore the book-shops of Florence, and often 
to copy out whole authors whose works he did 
not possess. He is described as a handsome man, of 
a cheerful aspect, and he wore a long purple robe 
reaching to his feet. Nicolao's usual costume was a 
red htcco ; but while Ser Filippo lived plainly, with 
only an old woman for servant, Nicolao carried his 
innate refinement into the minutest details of his home 
life. His table was spread with the finest linen, and 
furnished with lovely porcelain ; his drinking-cup a 
" coppa " of crystal. Maestro Pagolo was as well read 
as his companions, and though an astrologer, Ves- 
pasiano assures us that he was a most religious man. 
Last, but not least, was Cosimo dei Medici, whose 
financial genius had given him command of the 



A LIBRARY OF CODICES. 65 

Florentine " borsa," which at that time led the com- 
merce of the world ; and yet finance was but one 
among many talents. Vespasiano describes him as a 
grave citizen, a friend of serious men, and hater of 
buffoons and light characters. He recognized genius 
wherever he saw it, and was as friendly with simple 
Donatello, who was uncomfortable in the grand clothes 
he gave him, as he was with Messer Leonardo Bruni, 
or Ser Filippo the gonfaloniere, or that learned man 
Poggio Bracciolini. 

It was about 1434, after Cosimo had spent some 
time in exile in Venice, where Nicolao Nicoli bore 
him company, and had by one of the sudden vicissi- 
tudes of the day returned there a second time in state 
as ambassador, that his conscience accused him on 
account of certain money whose acquisition had been 
doubtful. He sought counsel of Pope Eugene, and 
at his suggestion decided to set apart 10,000 florins 
to rebuild the Convent of San Marco, to which the 
Pope had lately removed the chief seat of the 
Dominicans. This sum did not half finish the work, 
which he wished to be thorough. He not only rebuilt 
the convent, but furnished it. The artistic monks 
were set to work, and while Fra Angelico was 

5 



A LIBRARY OF CODICES. 67 

painting divine scenes on the walls of the cells, his 
brother illuminated choral books and psalters. 

About this time, Cosimo's friend Nicolao Nicoli 
was taken ill, and instead of going to Fra Ambrogio, 
he had an altar placed in his room, and the Frate daily 
came to him to say mass, and read St. Paul's Epistles. 
When he died in Fra Ambrogio's arms, he left his 800 
precious books to his city, with the proviso that they 
were to be of public service to all students. Forty 
citizens named in the will were to be intrusted with this 
bequest, and Cosimo proposed that the new public library 
should be in San Marco. So Michelozzi the architect 
designed the noble pillared room, which now contains 
Fra Benedetto's choral books, and here all the neatly 
written codices were placed, all bound and inscribed 
with Nicolao's name. Here, also, were removed at a 
later time the books which Boccaccio had left to the 
monks of Santo Spirito, packed in boxes, and for 
which Nicolao had had a library made at his own 
expense, that people might have more free access to 
them. Vespasiano says ^ that " when the books were 
placed, Cosimo studied the inventory to see what 
books were wanting among those necessary to form 
^ Vespasiano, "Vitadi Cosimo di Medici," par. ix. 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



a complete library, and that he sent far and wide 
to obtain them, and those which were not to be 
bought he caused to be copied." This sounds a little 
obscure, for one would imagine a library could never be 
complete ; but we learn from Vespasiano — the book- 
seller who formed and furnished the libraries of Sart 
Marco, the Badia, the Duke of Urbino, of Monte 
Oliveto Maggiore, near Siena, and of Cesena — that 
the learned Thomas of Sarzana, afterwards Pope 
Nicolas v., who had become an autocrat of literature,, 
had formed a scheme or inventory of the authors he 
considered necessary to the formation of a library, and 
this inventory he sent to Cosimo when the San MarcO' 
library was being formed.^ And this was the guide 
good Vespasiano followed in all his subsequent under- 
takings as a furnisher of bookshelves. The scheme 
included, as befitted an ecclesiastic, a larger proportion 
of theological than classical writers. All the Greek 
and Latin Fathers were represented ; then the modern 
doctors, such as Thomas d'Aquinas, Albertus Magnus, 
Alexander of Ales, and Archbishop Antonino of 
Florence, Then came the Greek philosophers, with 
the commentaries on them by the doctors above 
^ Vespasiano, " Vita di Papa Niccolo V,," par. vii. 



A LIBRARY OF CODICES. 69 

named ; then the Latin historians, Caesar, Livy, 
Suetonius, Plutarch, Sallust, Valerius Maximus, &c., 
and a more modern " History of the World " by Ser 
Zembino ; and lastly, the Latin poets and dramatists, 
including Terence, Virgil, Ovid, and Plautus. The 
Greek poets seem to have been entirely absent. 

Had the Laurentian library depended solely on 
the book trade of Vespasiano di Bisticchi or the 
limited requirements of the monks, content with a 
library on a set scheme, it would have remained 
without its o^reatest treasures. The other and chief 
source from which it was supplied, was the private 
library of the Medici family, whose desire for amassing 
classical treasures was unrestricted by the ecclesiastical 
bias which narrowed that of Pope Nicolas V. Cosimo 
employed Vespasiano, to give the monks of San 
Marco and the Badia all they thought necessary, but 
bis own shelves were enriched by precious codices 
gathered from all parts of the world. The collection 
he began, was continued by his son Piero, and his 
grandson Lorenzo il Magnifico. 

It may be said that Cosimo made the library and 
Lorenzo enjoyed it. In Cosimo's time, collecting 
books, founding buildings, and stocking libraries 



70 TUSCAN STUDIES. 

seemed the great object of life. In Lorenzo's, the 
stored-up learning had passed into the minds of the 
Florentines, and there were literary societies, debating 
clubs, commentating societies, &c., and all those 
brilliant assemblies where the mind of man saturated 
with classical lore, like the wick of a lamp with oil, 
flamed up and dazzled the whole world with its light. 
There was scarcely a friend of Cosimo who had not 
helped to form his collection. Poggio Bracciolini 
penetrated the cellars of the old convent at St. Gall, 
Switzerland, and brought Ouintilian to light, and 
found (or some say stole) Livy from Herseld Con- 
vent. Leonardo Bruni discovered Cicero's "Letters" 
at Pistoja, and Landrini brought his " Treatises" from 
Lodi. Fra Ambrogio translated the " De vita et 
moribus philosophorum " of Laertius Diogenes into 
Latin for Cosimo ; but it was under strong protest,^ 
for "he had made up his mind to write nothing that was 
not reliofious. He translated into Latin the works of 
St. John Chrysostom, St. Basil, St. Athanasius, and 
others. Many valuable Greek codices found their 
way to Cosinio's shelves from the hands of the 
learned Sicilian, Giovanni Aurispa, who made a voyage 
' Vespasiani, " Vita di Frate Ambrogio, or Traversari." 



A LIBRARY OF CODICES. 71 

to Byzantium in 1423, and brought home 258 Greek 
MSS. 

In Lorenzo's time, Andrea Giovanni Lascaris, the 
Greek, was sent to Constantinople after that city had 
fallen into the power of the Turks, to rescue as many 
MSS. as he could from the invader's hands. Lorenzo 
never lived to see the treasure of 200 codices, which 
he brought back, in 1492, but most of them were 
placed in the Medici library. 

Here we have, then, two great collections of ancient 
MSS., beautifully written and illuminated as books 
were before printing multiplied them, and rendered 
the delicate work of the scribe superfluous — the public 
Medicean Library at San Marco, in which Nicolao 
Nicoli's bequest was incorporated, and the private 
collection of the Medici family in their own palace in 
Via Larga, the growth of three generations of book 
lovers. 

It was through many vicissitudes that they became 
united at last. 

The present library in San Lorenzo, the founding 
of which was attributed to Pope Clement VII., is 
really due to Lorenzo il Magnifico, as is proved by a 
letter written to him by Vespasiano, praising his 



72 TUSCAX STUDIES. 



scheme of building it, and the letter of Lascaris dedi- 
catinor his " Antologfia Greca " to Piero, son of 
Lorenzo ; in which he speaks of it as half finished — 
" illam bibliothecam tuam, quae jam semi-constructa 
conspicitur. ^ 

This Piero was exiled on Nov. 9, 1494, and. from 
this date begin the vicissitudes of the codices. As 
soon as he was proclaimed rebel, Piero set himself to 
render secure the treasures of his house by choosing 
two Sindachi (trustees) to take care of them. The 
first were Bernardo Capponi and Benedetto Tanai de 
Nerli. They had time to save the books by packing 
them in seventeen cases, and sending them to the 
convent of San Marco for security ; but when the 
French entered Florence with Charles VIII. on Nov. 
17th, they, with the assistance of some disaffected 
Florentines, robbed the Medici palace of artistic 
treasures worth 100,000 scudi. 

The city had too much respect for literary gems to 
let the boxes remain placed about in the cells of the 
monks, so in 1495 the Signoria took the affairs of 
the rebel Medici in their hands, and decided, in a 

^ Enea Piccolomini, " Delle vicende della Libreria Medicea 
privata." Archivio storico Italiani, vol. xix. serie 3, p. 105. 



A LIBRARY OF CODICES. 72, 

council held August 31, 1495, that the cases should be 
opened, and the most valuable books brought to the 
Medici palace there to be preserved. A committee 
of judgment was formed, including the Greek Lascaris, 
Gio. Antonio Vespucci, Marsilio Ficino, and Vittorio 
Soderini. At the same meeting- Soderini was bid to 
send back Politian's copy of the Pandects. Lascaris 
was afterwards ordered to return books he had 
borrowed. 

The Signoria had no easy office in the custody of 
the Medici belongings, for many claims were made on 
them for debt. Among these was one of 2,000 florins 
to San Marco, for which the books seem to have been 
given in pledge ; and on Jan. 24, 1496, the Signoria 
decreed that the monks might sell books to that value 
and pay themselves. 

Then on Feb. 10, 1497, the council decreed the 
restitution of sixty-seven volumes to the , heirs of 
Francesco, Sassetti, . which he had lent or given in 
pledge — commodaverunt vs, the word used in the docu- 
ment — to Lorenzo de Medici in 149 1. 

There was another debt due to Charles VIII., king 
of France, and this the Signoria decided to pay by 
giving up the Medici collections ; but from the fact 



74 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



of the convent of San Marco paying to Filippo de 
Comines, the agent of Charles VIII., the sum of 
i,ooo ducats, besides the other 2,000 lent before, it 
would seem they were permitted to keep the books 
in pledge. They evidently began to exercise pro- 
prietorship over them, for they revised the inventory, 
and looking over the list of books which had been 
lent, sent to different persons to claim them. A fine 
of fifty florins was imposed on any one who had 
borrowed books from the Medici and did not restore 
them. The Florentine ambassador in Paris himself 
went to Lascaris to claim several codices which he 
had ; and Gualterotti, the ambassador at Milan, re- 
covered three Greek codices from Giovanni da Cas- 
tiglione. Politian rendered up a " Hippocrates," and 
Ficino and Mirandola returned other copies of classical 
authors. Thus between the Signoria and the Domi- 
nicans, the cases containing Lorenzo's MSS. had a 
double guard — the Signoria maintaining a right over 
them as trustees of the rebel's goods, and the Domi- 
nicans hoping that they would remain theirs in pay- 
ment of the loans made. The great care taken of 
them on all sides proved the reverence the precious 
codices were held in by^ that age. 



A LIBRARY OF CODICES. 75 

But now a greater peril menaced them. Savonarola 
was Prior, and in place of civil war, religious sects 
filled the city with clashing parties. The Arrabbiati 
besieged the convent on April 8, 1498, and while 
Baccio Valori defended the door of the church, and 
Fra Bartolommeo — then Baccio della Porta — fought 
for the altar, a band of spirited youths so well guarded 
the library that its treasures remained unhurt ; at least 
the inventory only bears a mark against one book, 
" Perso la nocte, addi Aprile 8, 1498." 

A month after the siege of San Marco, the Signoria 
removed the books from the convent and placed them 
in the " Sala dei Dieci di liberta e pace," one of the 
council chambers in the Palazzo Vecchio. It is thought 
this was decreed as much as an act of hostility to the 
Dominicans, as from care of the books themselves. 

The Dominicans proceeded on the former hypo- 
thesis, for they then sent in a claim for their 3,000 
florins. 

After remaining seven months in the palace, the 
Signoria placed the books, now disposed in twenty- 
seven cases, in the convent of the Badia ; and it was 
here that on Dec. 12, 1498, a new estimation was 
made, and it was decreed to pay in books the Domini- 



76 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



cans and the family Salviati, who also had a claim. 
The estimation took a long time, and the final division 
of the books was not made till June 19, 1500, when 
the monks of San Marco took two-thirds, and the 
Salviati one-third. It seems, however, that Cardinal 
Giovanni dei Medici was in treaty with the Salviati 
family in April, 1 506, to buy back some of the books 
from them. 

It was two years after this that the convent, after 
all its struggles to retain the treasure, was obliged, 
from financial distress, to sell the Medici library to 
Cardinal de' Medici, for the price of 2,652 ducats. 

The entry existed in the Archives of S. Maria 
Novella, in the hand of Fra Francesco Maria Gondi, 
a monk of that convent who was also Procurator of 
San Marco, that " on April 29, 1508, he sold to the 
cardinal of S. Pietro in Vincola, the library of thirty- 
two cases which had belonged to the Medici." ^ 

In 1 5 10 the library, then in the palace of Cardinal 
Medici in Rome, was open to students there, and 

^ Some historians, such as Picolomini, say this purchase was made 
by Cardinal della Rovere ; but no proofs remain. The document I 
have quoted was seen by Bandini, who quotes it in his catalogue of 
the library, 1752. Certain it is that in i5iothe Medicean library 
was in the palace of Cardinal Medici in Rome. 



A LIBRARY OF CODICES. 77 

Francisco Albertini gives a glowing account of it in 
his work *' De Mirabilibus novse et veteris urbis 
Romse," lib. iii. f. i68, printed in Rome in 1510. 

Cardinal de Medici became Pope Leo X., and after 
his death the library fell into the hands of Cardinal 
Giulio de Medici (Clement VII.), who decided to 
bring them back to Florence, and carry on Lorenzo's 
half-finished design of the library in San Lorenzo. 
Unfinished it was doomed to remain, for on the death 
of Clement VII., in 1534, the work was abandoned, 
and the books remained in the rooms of the priests' 
house in San Lorenzo, " a prey to dust, moths, and 
rats," as Varchi says. 

As soon, however, as Cosimo I. was proclaimed 
duke, he began to carry out his ancestor's designs. 
The books were collected, the building completed, at 
least in the interior, by Vasari — Michael Angelo's 
death occurring before the work was done — and the 
opening of the Laurentian Library was celebrated by 
a bronze medal, with Cosmo's likeness on one side, 
and the door of the building on the other with the 
motto, " Publicae utilitati." Its vicissitudes were over ; 
for four centuries the precious codices have rested, 
chained to their shelves, in the repose of that silent 




■ROM DONATELLO S ORGAN GALLERY, FORMERLY IN THE 
DUOMO OF FLORENCE. 



A LIBRARY OF CODICES. 79 

hall, where students look on them reverently, and 
tourists with a vague curiosity. The first librarians 
were Baccio Valori and Giovanni Rondinelli. 

Other streams of learnino- have flowed into this 
calm lake. The Medicean Public Library from San 
Marco was incorporated in it, and the books with 
Nicoli's name have found a resting-place there. In 
1755, when the Grand Duke Francisco I. bought the 
Gaddiana Library, consisting of 1,110 manuscripts 
and 1,451 printed books, 355 of the finest codices 
were placed in the Laurentian Library, and 28 in the 
Archives ; the rest, with the printed works, were put 
into the Magliabecchian Library. The Grand Duke 
Pietro Leopoldo removed here 600 codices from the 
convent of Santa Croce, and the valuable collection 
of Oriental MSS. which were in the Pitti Palace. 
Codices found their way here from the Badia, the 
Riccardiana, and Magliabecchian libraries and other 
sources, till it grew to be the finest illustrative history 
of literature before the age of printing that the world 
possesses. Its principal gems are the Medicean 
Virgil, the earliest known MS. which was revised by 
Tertius Apronianus in a.d. 494, and the Pandects of 
Justinian, found at Amalfi in 1135 by the Pisans, 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



who preserved them with great veneration for some 
centuries, till the Florentines captured Pisa in 1406. 
Once a year a deputation visited the place where the 
book was kept, and the magnates, churchly and 
secular, stood bare-headed, while the books were 
opened with great ceremony beneath a silken pall,, 
and surrounded by many waxen tapers. There are 
also two fragments of Tacitus, for one of which, con- 
taining the last six books of the Annals, Pope Leo 
X. paid 500 golden florins, when it was discovered 
by Arcimboldi in a monastery of Westphalia ; a 
Quintus Curtius of the tenth century, a copy of 
Cicero written by the hand of Petrarch, and Terence 
copied by Politian. The early MSS. of Dante, 
Boccaccio, Petrarch, &c., are extremely interesting. 
Benvenuto Cellini's MS. of his autobiography has 
also a place here. 

The MSS. are arranged in long reading benches 
like church pews, with a catalogue of the works on 
each bench at the end. There is a cloister-like silence 
and calm always reigning in the library, where the 
sun shines through the painted windows of Giovanni 
da Udine with a " dim religious light," in harmony 
with one's feelings of veneration in such a shrine of 
intellect. 



CHAPTER III. 

®lb Italian ©rgans anb tbeir 
Builbers- 

N visiting Italian churches one is often 
struck with the sight of certain ancient 
organs, thrust out of view at the back 
of choirs or in distant corners of sacris- 
ties. These dilapidated instruments are in rough, 
worm-eaten cases, and have rattling keys of yellow 
and brown wood, often possessing half an octave of 
pedals, acting on ropes. Altogether they give an 
idea of church music in its most primitive form. We 
can fancy them surrounded by a group of those quaint 
expressive chorister boys, with square cut hair and 

6 




S2 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



long white drapery, which Ghirlandajo delighted to 
paint. 

It was with great interest I found one day a pam- 
phlet by " Cesare Guasti." entitled *' Di un INIaestro 
d'Oroani del sccolo X\'.." which oave a sketch of the 
life of the very man who might have made these old 
organs. 

The subject proved so attractive as to induce further 
researches by the aid of the Magliabecchian and more 
modern libraries, the result of which I give in the 
following sketch, which may form some useful notes 
for a future historian of the oro'an. 



I.— RUDLAIENTARY ORGANS. 

Although writers like to assert oi the organ, as of 
many other things, that its origin is lost in obscurity, 
it is possible to trace almost every step in its growth 
from the davs of Tubal Cain or the o-reat ood Pan, 
when its music existed in the wind-blown reeds. 

Without doubt the fn-st wind instrument was the 
natural reed : next the artiticial lUite and trumpet. 

The hrst step to plurality of pipes seems to be the 
Egyptian fiia??! and the Etruscan siibiiio, or double 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 83 

pipe, said to have come from Lydia. The Assyrians 
also had this flute ; the Greeks called it diaulos, and a 
specimen of one found in a tomb at Athens exists in 
the British Museum. 

From duality we reach plurality, in the syrinx or pan- 
pipes, called by Ovid arzmdo cerata, or wax cemented 
pipes. 

The next step was obviously to keep the many pipes 
supplied with wind from a common source. Here we 
have the piva {tibia tUricularis), or shepherd's pipes, 
on which Marsyas was so great a proficient as to 
excite Apollo's envy. These were a leather skin 
with several pipes inserted, which were played by 
pressing the fingers on the different holes. 

The Greeks called them ascaulos, and in Rome they 
were the favourite instrument of the Emperor Nero. 
The last remnants of these still linger in the Highland 
pipers and the Pifferari, who go down to Rome at 
Christmas time from the Abruzzi. It is supposed that 
the word stcmphonia, in the Book of Daniel, refers to 
a bagpipe. The antiquaries who support the Hebrew 
theory with regard to the Etruscans, will be interested 
in comparing this name with that of " Zampogna," 
given to the bagpipes by the Italian peasantry. Now, 



84 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



while the western Aryan nations developed the piva 
out of the subulo, the races farther east enlarged the 
syrinx into something of the same kind ; but approach- 
ing still more nearly to the Aryan, they mounted their 
pan-pipes on a wind-chest and played them with the 
fingers. There are instruments of this kind on the 
Assyrian sculptures ; the air-box is supported by a 
band round the waist of the player, who blows with 
one hand while he fingers the holes of the pipes with 
the other. Mr. Barker ^ gives a description of an 
ancient sculpture found at Tarsus (2,000 years old), 
which represents a kind of organ with pipes and bel- 
lows, pressed by the hand — in fact, pan-pipes with 
bellows. 

The Chinese and Japanese have their ckeng, a box 
with a number of tubes of different lengths inserted 
into it. Each tube has a small metallic tongue like 
our accordion ; the player blows into the air-box by a 
spout at the side, and presses the holes of the tubes 
with his fingers. In Laos and Siam similar instru- 
ments are found, although different in form.- The 

* " Cilicia and its Governors," p. 260. 

= Carl Engel "Music of the Most Ancient Nations," chap. i. 
p. 18. 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 85 

Hindoos have an instrument called /^<?;2^2 or magoudi, 
which is a hollow gourd or cuddos nut with pipes 
inserted ; this is the music used by the savipU7'is, or 
snake-charmers. 

Next comes the wonderful Magrepha of the 
Hebrews — that nation of psalmody — described in the 
Talmud (tract Erachin) as standing in the temple at 
Jerusalem. It was a case containing ten pipes, each 
pipe capable of emitting ten sounds by means of 
different valves. It had, moreover, two pairs of 
bellows and ten keys, which were played by the fingers.^ 
Drawings of this great organ, which many writers 
consider apocryphal, are to be found in some older 
treatises on Hebrew music, and there is one in 
Hawkins' "History of Music." ^ The ten pipes and 
holes seem to prove the existence of the pentatonic 
scale according to Carl Engel's theory. 

The organ spoken of in the Book of Job, xxi. 12 — 
" They take the timbrel and harp, and rejoice in the 
sound of the organ " — is supposed by Engel to be the 
zigah, a kind of pandean pipe, the word in Hebrew 
being oogav. The Septuagint, however, has trans- 

^ Engel's " Music of Most Ancient Nations," chap. vi. p. 297. 
^ Vol. i. p. 256. 



86 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



lated the word " psalmos" (a psalm). The same word 
occurs also in Job xxx. 31 in conjunction with harp, 
as if it were a musical instrument. The Diodati 
version of the Bible gives the word orgaiio in both 
places, with a marginal note " Sampogna " (bag-pipes). 

II.— EARLIEST ORGANS. 

It would be difficult to say who was the inventor 
of the organ proper, though it is as easy to trace the 
transition from the compressible wind-bag to the fixed 
wind-chest and artificial bellows, as it is to see how the 
graduated reeds of Pan grew into the piva through 
the more archaic tibia and stihilo of the ancients. 
Some attribute the invention to Archimedes 220 b.c. ; 
others to Ctesibus, an Alexandrian barber, about 
180 B.C. Gibbon speaks of the Romans in the time 
of the Emperors amusing themselves with hydraulic 
organs. 

It is a mooted question what these instruments 
were ; it has been thought that they were the same 
as the Greek hydrazilos, a kind of water-flute ; but 
that there were really organs, although small and 
primitive, is proved by the representation of one on 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 87 

a coin of the Emperor Nero. It consists of a box 
as large as a small table, and ten pipes inserted in it. 
There is no indication as to the way in which it was 
played ; but this information is supplied by Cassio- 
dorus, who describes an organ in Theodoric's time as 
a tower made of divers pipes which have a full and 
copious voice: "et ut earn modulatio decora componat, 
linguis quibusdam ligneis ab interiore parte constructur 
quas disciplinabiliter magistrorum digiti reprimentes 
grandisonam efficiunt et suavissimam cantilenam."^ 

From this it would seem that the Roman organs 
were similar to the still more ancient ones, and that 
the fingers played on the pipes themselves v/ith this 
difference, that instead of pressing the holes they 
pressed tongues of wood inserted into the pipe. Here 
is the link wanting between the modern key-board and 
the simple pipe. As to the hydraulic part of the instru- 
ment, descriptions are not wanting in the old writers 
— Hero of Alexandria, Vitruvius, Claudian, and Ter- 
tullian, for instance — descriptions not very clear, but 
still intelligible. The water was only the regulator 
of the wind, not the tone producer ; the chest had two 
closely shut reservoirs, of which one was filled with 
^ " Gloss maed et inf Lat. voce Orcanare." 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



water and connected with the other, so by means of 
counter pressure it gave the wind equality and power. 

An illustration from the Theodosian Obelisk at 
Constantinople shows that about the fifth century the 
larger organs were blown by weight, two men being 
represented standing on the bellows. Bal^entrete7^, 
or " bellovvs-treaders," were common for many cen- 
turies, and may even now be seen in some remote 
continental churches. 

After the fifth century the organ begins to have a 
recognized history. It was brought to Europe from 
the Greek empire, and used in religious devotions 
about A.D. 657. Pope Vitalianus introduced it into 
the Western churches in 658. 

The Greek Emperor Constantinus Copronimus sent 
one of these instruments to King Pepin of France in 
750, which was placed in the Church of St. Corneille 
at Compiegne. 

They are again mentioned as having been imported 
from Greece under Charlemagne, a.d. 800. A monk 
of St. Gall named Notker Balbulus gives a very 
exaggerated account of one in his time.-^ 

Charlemagne's son, Ludovic the Pius, a.d. 826, 
^ " De rebus bellici Caroli M.," lib. 11, n. 10. 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 89 

had an organ constructed by an Italian priest, which 
proves that Italy was not much, if at all, behind 
Germany in their construction. The story is in the 
•annals of Eginard,^ who says that a Venetian priest 
named Giorgio went from Venice to Ludovic, boasting 
that he knew how to make organs. The Emperor, 
no doubt willing to emulate his father, sent the priest 
to Aquisgrana (Aix la Chapelle), giving an order that 
he was to be provided with everything needful for the 
•construction of the instrument. 

Ermoldo Nigello, an historian of the ninth century, 
mentions, in an elegiac poem on Ludovic the Pius, 
just such an organ, which he says was hydraulic. 

That the Germans were proficient in organ building 
at or before this time is certain. A letter is extant 
from Pope Giovanni VIII. to Bishop Anno of Frey- 
sing, in Bavaria, in 880, praying him to send him 
" a good organ, and an artist who knows how to play 
and construct." ^ 

Aldhelm, an Anglo-Saxon writer (a.d. 709), says 
organs were in use in England in his time, and that 
the external pipes were gilded. 

^ " De gestis Ludovici Pii." 

^ " Miscellanies of Baluzio," lib. i, p. 490. 



90 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



The Benedictine Wulston relates that Bishop 
Elphege had one made for Winchester Cathedral In 
941, which had four hundred pipes and twenty-six 
bellows, and required seventy men to blow ! It would 
be perplexing to imagine how one man could play all 
this, but it seems there were only ten keys, and forty 
pipes sounded when each was pressed. 

We can believe when Charlemagne's historian says 
the organs have the sound of thunder, but are not 
credulous when he goes on to say, " they can also 
imitate the soft lyre." As only two notes could be 
played at a time, one with each fist, the organ was 
only used for the melody and an accompaniment In. 
octaves or fifths. Guido, who lived in the eleventh 
century, says no other harmonies were known. 

There is a curious illustration in the Saxon psalter 
of Eadwine in Trinity College Library, Cambridge, 
of an organ with two players and four blowers at 
different bellows, all working very energetically. 

Pratorlus, who wrote the "Syntagma Muslcum," 161 9, 
speaks of an organ built by Nicolaus Faber at Hal- 
berstadt In 1391, which had twenty bellows, and one 
in Magdeburg with twenty-four. Faber's organ had 
fourteen diatonic and eight chromatic keys, three 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 91 

manuals and some pedals, but it is supposed the latter 
were added by its restorer a century later. 

Some old artists have given representations of a 
small portable organ called the " regal " ; it is generally 
placed in the hands of St. Cecilia or an angel. Good 
illustrations of it are a picture in the National Gallery 
by Melozzo da Forli, and Raphael's exquisite "St. 
Cecilia." There is a very good painting of a regal, 
played on the lap and blown from the back, in TaddeO' 
Gaddi's allegorical fresco of the sciences in the Spanish 
chapel of Santa Maria Novella. 

The English chronicler, William of Malmesbury,. 
says that hydraulic organs were made from a.d. 999 tO' 
1003 by a monk called Benedetto Gerberto, who was 
afterwards elevated to the Papal rank as Sylvester II.. 

From these notes we gather that in feudal times 
this art, as well as most of the liberal arts, remained 
in the hands of the monks. Later, when under the 
commonwealths and dukedoms arts and professions, 
were protected, we find notices of laymen who made 
organ building their profession. The first of whom 
any authentic documents remain seems to have been 
the " Maestro d'Organi," who is the subject of Signor 
Guasti's able paper. 



•92 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



III.— ITALIAN ORGAN BUILDERS. 

In the year 1393 there was a certain worthy baker 
at Prato, called Paolo di Piero, who had a wife, Paola, 
and five children, the youngest of whom, Matteo, was 
then two years old. Their names are all in the tax- 
papers of that year, preserved in the Archives of the 
State. The papers of 1408 show the household to 
have increased in worldly wealth, and to have become 
possessed of a house. In 1427 the family was broken 
up. The father dead, the widow working on a podere 
at Figline, the eldest son married and possessing 
houses, and Matteo — married to a wife Betta, and 
possessor of the third of a house — is nominated as 
•** Matteo di Paolo di Prato, che fa gli organi." ^ 

There was quite a group of organ builders at Prato 
in the fifteenth century, but none are spoken of prior 
to Matteo. The Lorenzo di Giacomo who made the 
■organ for the Duomo of Siena (1459), San Petronio of 
Bologna (1471), and San Francesco of Cortona (before 
1474), is supposed to have been his fellow-worker or 
scholar ; and Benricevuto di Ser Lionardo di Prato is 

^ Cesare Guasti, "Di un Maestro d'Organi," p. 2. 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 93, 

known to have been his disciple. But from whom Matteo^ 
learned the art, there remains nothing to tell us. 

That he was a proficient in it, his wide -spread 
fame shows, for he was called to all parts of Italy to 
furnish the churches with organs. The first of which 
we have any record are those — for they are always 
spoken of as " un paiod'organi " — of the Baptistery of 
Florence in 1425, for which Richa says he was paid 
400 florins, and had the old organs given him.^ It 
is said that Squarcialupi made an organ for the Bap- 
tistery in 1476, but it is more probable that he only 
repaired this one. 

So great was his occupation in Florence at the epoch 
of the revival of art, that he took up his residence 
there ; and while Brunelleschi reared his dome, grand 
and rosy tinted, into the air — while Ghiberti and Dona- 
tello laboured at their beautiful doors and statues, and 
Filippo Lippi and Benozzo Gozzoli covered the church 
walls with glorious frescoes — Matteo of Prato made 
the organs for those boys to sing hymns to, whom 
Ghirlandajo has made immortal in the lunettes of the 
arches of Santa Fina's chapel at San Gemignano. 
The other artists gave the outer beauty ; he furnished 
^ Richa, " Notizie intorno delle Chiese Fiorentine," v. 39. 



■94 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



the music which is the soul of worship. Those were 
grand times, when art sprang into being on every wall 
and roof, and made Florence a joy and a beauty for 
ever. 

It is probable that Donatello was the means of 
bringing Matteo to Florence, he having formed a 
friendship with him while carving the exquisite pulpit 
of the Cintola outside Prato Cathedral. The commis- 
sion for it is still extant with Matteo's name as witness, 
and there is a letter in the Archives written by Matteo 
on behalf of Donatello, praying immediate payment for 
one part of this pulpit, as the sculptor wanted money 
for xh^feste which were coming on. 

The next organ that Matteo had a commission for 
was that of the Duomo of Florence ; Donatello and 
Luca della Robbia being at the same time desired to 
sculpture a pergamo to adorn it.^ And on August 4, 
1422, Matteo received the first instalment of his pay- 
ment, fifteen florins, another twenty florins being paid 
in June the following year. Donatello's and Luca's 
exquisite sculptures of singing boys and maidens are 
still to be seen in the Bargello in Florence ; but Matteo's 

^ " Archivio dell' Opera di S. Maria del Fiore," lib. deliberazione 
i. a.c. 192^ 




LUCA DELLA ROBBIA S GALLERY. 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



instrument was less durable, for in 1426 it had to be 
repaired. About this time he was employed by the Luc- 
chese to make an organ for the church of San Francesco ; 
but the war between Florence and Lucca, and the plan 
of Filippo Brunelleschi to drown Lucca in the waters of 
the Serchio, evidently alarmed our good organ builder, 
who did not fulfil his engagement till after peace was 
made, when the Lucchese sent a letter to the " Domini 
Florentini, ' ^ begging them to compel Matteo to keep 
his promise. He must have done so to their satisfaction, 
for in 1442 he had a commission to furnish the Cathe- 
dral of Lucca with an organ. Meanwhile he still 
worked at that for the Duomo of Florence, which was 
so far finished in 1434 that we find an order was given 
to Angelo di Lazzaro to make the case, and Matteo 
was paid on account 100 gold florins. Antonio Squar- 
cialupi, Lorenzo's friend, the musical geniusof his time, 
had already been appointed organist, and the restored 
organ was to have been opened when Pope Eugennis. 
IV. came to consecrate the Duomo in March, 1436* 
but owing to Matteo's numerous engagements it was 
not ready, which annoyed the Arte della Lana extremely. 
In the next year they called on Matteo to forfeit the 
^ "Archiviodi Stati in Lucca." Lettere degli Anziani, No. 551. 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 97 

money advanced ; but we find them still waiting in 
1438, which proves that though he was dilatory, yet no 
better organ builder was to be found. Extension of 
time being allowed him, he still procrastinated, and in 
December of that year the work was taken out of his 
hands and given to Arrigo di Migliore Guidotti, Matteo 
being bound to refund his pay advanced in rates of forty 
florins a year, and to restore within six days 2,000 
lbs. of lead and 300 lbs. of tin which had been provided 
for his work. 

The metals he returned promptly, but the florins 
were not forthcoming, and in 1442 he wrote a piteous 
letter to the Opera del Duomo, begging to be released 
from payment for the love of God, and saying " if he had 
to pay it he must beg bread to feed his little daughter." 

Apparently Arrigo Guidotti proved a bad substitute 
for Matteo, for the members of the Opera were not 
satisfied with his work, and the Prato organ builder 
was recalled to finish it, which he did satisfactorily in 
1448. During these years he made an organ for the 
Badia in Florence, for which he had ninety gold florins, 
together with the old organs, valued at thirty florins. I n 
1450 this was also repaired by him, or, more properly 
speaking, completed, the case and a large pipe being 

7 



98 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



added. He also made the organs in the church of 
Or San IMIchele In 1428, those of the Annunziata in 
Florence^ in 1453, in which he was assisted by his 
pupil, Benricevuto di Ser Lionardo. 

In 145 1, he was paid in three rates for an instrument 
in the church of St. Egidio, near the Florentine Hos- 
pital, and in 1452 another for St. Ambrogio ; also for 
San Lorenzo, in 1461, and that of San Frediano. 

So great was his fame, that the Arte di Calimala gave 
him a house in Via degli Spadai in Florence, and there 
he died, September 24, 1465, and was buried in the 
church of San Lorenzo, leaving his pupil and partner, 
Benricevuto, his heir. 

It is impossible to say how much this humble organ 
builder had to do wuth the great religious revival which 
followed the renaissance of the arts and literature at 
this period. It is certain that before Savonarola 
poured his thunders of eloquence over Florence, there 
was a strong revival of religion which took a musical 
form. 

Men, women, and even children, assembled in the 
churches to sing " Laudesi " or spiritual songs. These 
were composed by Lorenzo il IMagnifico himself or by 
^ "Carte del Convento dell Annunziata di Firenze," ac. 75. 




SANVONAROLA PREACHING. 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



his mother, Lucrezia Tornabuoni, or Luigi Pulci, 
Giambullari, and others. 

Every Saturday, after nones, the congregation sang 
them, the priests taking alternate parts. 

'''Ad ogni Laude si mutavano i Cantori, e finito il 
detto canto a siwno d'organo, di campane, e di voce si 
ricopriva la devota Immagine di tcna Madonna in atto 
di chiederne la benedizioneT ^ 

There were evening processions of Laudesi, and great 
expense was gone to for wax hghts. Every company 
had a captain. Gio, Lotteringhi Stanaiolo was leader of 
the Laudesi of Sta Maria Novella, 

What pictures one can imagine of the scenes and 
music of these old organs of Matteo's ! What crowds of 
earnest singers sang to them as they sounded under 
the fingers of Maestro Andrea, or of Antonio Squar- 
cialupi, who played so well that Lorenzo de' Medici 
kept him constantly in his house, and when he died 
wrote his epitaph, in which he says, " The city of 
Florence preserves the grateful memory of one whose 
hands knew how to charm with sweet music." He 
was a maker as well as a player. 

That Lorenzo was very fond of organ music may be 
^ Dell Rosso, "Osservatore Fiorentino," vol. i. p. 127. 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. loi 

seen by the inventory of his house, ^ which mentions no 
less than five different organs. The descriptions of 
some of them are rather curious ; for instance, an organ 
of pasteboard {carta-iinpastatd) beautifully worked 
in open work on a base of carved walnut-wood, and 
with four chandeliers on four children's figures, with 
three bellows and leads {piombi). Another is an organ 
of tin and wood, with gravecordo (which might mean 
clavecord) worked with foliage and open carving, 
gilded, with two bellows. 

" A reed organ, one reed to a key-simple," seems 
more explicit ; but " A cardboard organ, made like a 
snail-shell, with open work, In a wooden case with two 
bellows " — this is certainly a little obscure, and must 
have been, to say the least, curious. 

Some of the Florentine artists took to making reed- 
organs, and Benvenuto Cellini writes, " My father in 
those days made wonderful organs with canne (or 
pipes) of wood ; he made also gravicemboli (harpsi- 
chords), the best and most beautiful that one could see." 

The elder Cellini was Pifferaro to the Signoria, but 
Lorenzo and Plero de Medici removed him from the 
band that he might not neglect his art of carving in 
^ " Inventario di Casa Medici." MS. in the Archives of Florence. 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



ivory, in which he excelled to a great degree. Many 
of the exquisite ivory carvings now in the Bargello 
might have been by his hand. 

The next century (sixteenth) produced some still 
more famous Italian builders, of whom the chief were 
the family Antegnati of Brescia, who made a hundred 
and forty organs in different provinces. Graziadio, son 
of Bartolommeo Antegnati, was the most exact and 
successful, and his son Costanzo was his worthy suc- 
cessor, being not only organ maker, but player and 
composer. He was the author of a rare old book called 
" L'Arte Organica," printed at Brescia in 1608. Bar- 
tolommeo, his grandfather, supplied the cathedral 
churches of Milan, Como, Bergamo, Brescia, Cremona, 
and Mantua with organs. 

The Milanese Cristoforo Valvassori was also famous 
as an excellent maker.- 



IV.— GERMAN IMPROVEMENTS. 

Whether or not the Germans can claim the inven- 
tion of the instrument, it is undeniable that most of the 



^ Vita di B Cellini, pp. 9 and 10. 
^ " Ency. Ital.," voce Organo. 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 103 

modern improvements were of German origin ; and a 
slight mention of a few of these would not be out of 
place. 

The invention of the pedal is attributed to an organist 
of Ntirnberg, named Bernhard, in 1470, whom the 
Italians claim as organist at Venice, but it is probable 
that he was only an improver, because two old pedal 
pipes, with the date 141 8 engraved on the kern or 
partition, were found by Marx in an ancient orgau 
at Beeskow, near Frankfort on the Oder. There 
are also the set of pedals in Nicolaus Faber's before- 
mentioned organ of 136 1, at Halberstadt,to be accounted 
for — if indeed they were not added at its restoration in 
1494 by Gregorius. 

The next improvement was that called by Italian 
writers " bilancia pneumatica" or " prova pneumatica," 
an invention for equalizing the pressure of wind ; thus 
not only giving to each register the even supply of 
wind necessary for its just intonation, but also making 
it possible to supply wind at different pressure to the 
different stops, according to their several characters. 
This important step was due to Cristiano Forner, 
organist of Wettin, in the seventeenth century. 

The free reed was introduced by a German named 



104 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



Kratzenstein In the eighteenth century, but its real origin 
is quite prehistoric. It may be well to explain that 
flute pipes have the air forced in through a lip or sharp 
edge of wood or metal, while reed pipes have a vibrating 
tongue of metal or wood. The principle of the reed 
pipe was known to the ancient Egyptians, for flutes 
have been discovered in the tombs with a kind of thick 
straw inserted into them for the purpose of vibration.^ 
Moreover Kratzenstein's free reed came in reality from 
that most conservative nation China, where it might 
have existed for thousands of years. It happened that 
Kratzenstein was at St. Petersburg during the reign of 
Catherine II., and seeing there a cheng, of which the 
pipes are constructed with a free reed, the idea came 
into his mind of applying the principle to organ, 
pipes. 

Reed pipes are of two kinds — those in which the 
vibrating tongues strike against the plate in which It is 
set, and the free reed, which vibrates in a space cut for 
it as In our accordion and harmonium. ^ The striking 
reed, which had the most power and penetrating tone, 
was almost exclusively used In English organs until 

^ Engel's "Musical Instruments," p. 12. 
^ Engel's " Musical Instruments," p. 4- 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 105 

lately, when the more delicate free reed was introduced 
from France. 

Other improvements, such as the present form of 
the clavier or key-board, had already been brought in 
as natural results of the renaissance of the fifteenth 
century. The old form of the keys went out when the 
new system of notation came in and fuller harmonies 
were required. After the tenth or twelfth centuries, 
the organ beater {pulsator organorzmi) became the 
organ player, no longer using his fist, but his fingers. 

The notation in use among the ancients was most 
likely the Greek one of Tespandro of Lesbos, 650 
B.C. He named the notes by letters, probably the five 
vowels, as the old scale was pentatonic. The Romans 
and the Hebrews also used the vowel sounds. Boetius 
introduced fifteen letters, which Gregory the Great, 
considering the equal tones in each octave, reduced to 
seven. 

Modern notation, which began with the invention of 
the stave, first of four lines and after with five, is attri- 
buted to Ubaldo, a Benedictine monk, born 848 ; he 
was either French or Belgian. It has been said that 
the notation at present in use was brought to Italy 
by the Longobards ; but it is more likely that Guido of 



io6 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



Arezzo, for whom it is also claimed, improved Ubaldo's 
method/ However this be, the semitones or black 
notes were added to the clavier in the fourteenth cen- 
tury. Huebald and Guido, writers of the tenth and 
eleventh centuries, say that the progressions of fifths, 
fourths, and octaves were the only harmonies known 
in their days. If they could only have imagined the 
glorious harmonies of a modern great organ ! 

There is an interesting old work on organ building 
in the Magliabecchian Library in Florence. It is a repro- 
duction in five or six folio volumes, dated 1766, of the 
work of Bedos de Celles, who lived some centuries 
earlier. In it we find that "to give wind to an organ 
of 4 metres So centi-metres it is needful to have four 
bellows ; and if there is a little organ besides, six are 
necessary. These are constructed as other bellows are, 
and are generally i*8o metres long and 1*82 wide." 
This seems to explain the accounts in the early part of 
this paper, of organs which required a plurality of 
blowers. 

^ "Ency. Ital.," voce Organo. 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND THEIR BUILDERS. 107 

v.— LATER ITALIAN ORGAN BUILDERS. 

This can be little more than a list of the names of 
those through whose hands the organ continued to im- 
prove till it reached its present perfection in the nine- 
teenth century. In the eighteenth century lived a 
priest, Manduno Salmatino, who with his pupil, Callido, 
were celebrated makers in Venice. Callido himself 
made three hundred and eighteen organs. In Siena 
the cavalier Azzolino della Ciaja flourished, and in 
Pistoja was quite acompany of organ builders — Filippo 
and Antonio Tronci, together with Luigi and Benedetto, 
Filippo's sons, and Ramai his pupil formed one group, 
while Pietro Agati and his son Giosue were their 
rivals. 

A curious old organ which has the name of Giosue 
on a board across the foot of the pipes exists in the 
village church of Piteglio, in the Pistojese mountains. 
But it is evident he was only the restorer of a very 
much older instrument, for the inscribed board is 
decidedly newer than any other part. There are two 
bellows, which are worked by a rope so cunningly 
adjusted round two heavy windlasses, that by pull- 
ing one way, the left one turns in one direction and 



loS TUSCAN STUDIES, 



the right the other : so b\- reversing the motion the 
right bellows are raised and the left lowered. There 
are eight pedals, which seem to be tuned in fourths ; 
they move by means of strings or cords. The clavier 
has about two and a half octaves of wooden keys. 
But the most curious part is the appendage o'i two 
rough boxes, one on each side of the organ. One of 
them contains a huge drum ; the other a monster pair of 
cymbals, of which the upper valve is hung, and the 
lower one strikes upon it on moving an iron arm. by 
means of a large pedal. The drum is beaten in the 
same way. 

The country people evidently look on this arrange- 
ment, which they call " La Banda;' as the finest part of 
their church music. 

The two famous oroans in the oreat monasteries of 
Montecasino and Subiaco were built by the family 
Catarinozzi ; and that of the Benedictine monastery of 
Catania, said at the time to be the finest in the world, 
was by Donato di Calabria. Serassi of Bergamo not 
only made more than three hundred organs, but wrote 
a great work on the subject ; and the brothers Lingiardi, 
of Pavia, ranked high. In these days, however, when 
the instrument is brought to such perfection, these an- 



OLD ITALIAN ORGANS AND TJIEIR liUILDERS. 109 

tlque masterpieces seem to us only a foreshadowing of 
the perfect organ. Anr] I have after all only been 
telling the story of the organ's remote ancestors and 
prototypes. 




CHAPTER IV. 




jflorentine Mosaics* 

^^ 

LTHOUGH the remote forefather of the 
Florentine mosaic may be found in such 
works as the incrustation of the Duomo 
with inlaid marbles, and the pictured floor 
of Siena Cathedral, yet its immediate parent in its 
modern development was the renaissance of gem cut- 
ting and cameo making ; and the place of its birth was 
a certain casino or laboratory in which Lorenzo il 
Magnifico set his gem cutters to work. Like all the 
arts of the fifteenth century, that of intaglio was but a 
revival of the ancient work which exists in its Tuscan 
form in the Etruscan scarab, its Greek form in the 



FLORENTINE MOSAICS. m 

exquisite intagli of Dioscorides, Scylax, Polycrates> 
&c., and the Roman cameos. It was not abandoned 
even by the early Christians, for we have a cameo head 
of Christ of the seventh century, and the Gnostic gems 
of a still earlier period. The gem room of the Floren- 
tine gallery shows specimens of cameos dating from 
the fourteenth century. But there was no great revival 
till the time of Lorenzo de' Medici, who became an 
enthusiastic collector of the precious ancient gems, 
which were being found so frequently in Rome at that 
time. 

His grandfather Cosimo Pater Patrice was the first 
of the family to possess a treasure of the kind, a large 
intaglio of Apollo and Marsyas, and he valued it so 
greatly that he employed Ghiberti to make a beautiful 
golden setting for it. 

Lorenzo, having his cabinets full of gems, was 
anxious to revive the ancient art, and invited artist- 
engravers from other cities as teachers. He caused 
many of the young artists who were being trained in 
the " Medici Garden " to become mtagliatori, and gave 
them a studio in his own house. Here he supplied 
them with materials and lent them his precious antiques 
as copies, giving them also ideas for new subjects from 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



his stores of classic lore. The gems made in this 
studio are inscribed generally LAVR. MED. Several 
of them are in the gem room of the Uffizi, and one, 
a lion passant on red sardonyx, is in the British 
Museum. 

From this school came the famous Giovanni delle 
Corniole (John of the Cornelians), who in 1498 exe- 
cuted the beautiful intaglio likeness of Savonarola, 
and a portrait of Lucrezia Tornabuoni on red jasper, 
both of which are in the Uffizi. 

Another famous scholar was Domenico Compagni, 
called Domenico dei Cammei, who was as famous for 
his reliefs as Giovanni for his incavi (intagli or cut 
in). He made a cameo portrait of Lorenzo in a toga, 
on onyx, and an armed bust of Ludovico Sforza (il 
Moro) on a large ruby balais, or pink topaz. 

Pier Maria di Pescia, who went to Rome when 
Raphael was excavating there, profited so much from 
his study of the antique that he became the finest gem 
cutter of his age. There is an exquisite " Venus and 
the Loves " by him in the Florentine gallery. 

The revival was now fully established. The Duke 
of Ferrara and other princes followed Lorenzo's 
fashion, and had their court intaaliatori. Berna.rdi 



FLORENTINE MOSAICS. 113 

worked for Duke, Pope (Clement VII,), and Emperor 
(Charles V.), and Michael Angelohimself drew designs 
for him. 

Matteo dal Nassaro went to Paris to cut cameos for 
Francis I. ; Caraglio to Poland to engrave gems and 
medallions for Sigismund, king of Poland, in 1539 ; 
but Valerio de' Belli, or Valerio Vicentino (born 1479), 
remained in Italy, where his masterpieces are. By him 
is the wonderful casket of rock crystal which is now in 
the gem room of the Uffizi, after having been made a 
present to King Francis I. by Pope Clement. It 
has seventeen exquisite squares of intagli of subjects 
from the life of Christ. Several of the finest vases in 
the gem room were made by Valerio, for the Medici, 
of agate, lapis lazuli, jasper, cornelian, &c. 

At the end of the sixteenth century intaglio as a fine 
art began to languish, the taste became debased, and 
instead of the exquisite finezza of work, curiosities 
of stone, either in colour or size, made the value of the 
gem. Of this time we have the huge cameo with the 
portraits of Cosimo and Leonora and their children, on 
an onyx seven inches and a half in diameter. A winged 
genius holding a torch flies above the group, and in the 
centre is a picture of Florence inserted in a circle. 

8 



114 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



Another remarkable work is the large cameo on sar- 
donyx of several layers, representing a wild beast fight 
held on the Piazza della Signoria. It is a crowded 
subject, and a certain effect of perspective is obtained 
by the gradation of shades in the successive layers of 
stone, the animals being on a dark part, the background 
of spectators on a lighter layer. 

There are in the same museum immense cameos 
of peacocks and grotesque subjects on variegated 
jaspers, and a really beautiful Venus cut in high re- 
lief on the pink layer of a rare stone, some Cupids 
holding a white veil behind her. 

But perhaps the greatest cause of the decline of 
gem cutting in Florence was the different purpose 
to which precious stones were dedicated in the 
Medici studio. The same love of rarity, which we 
have spoken of, led Lorenzo and his successors to 
a lavish display of wealth of material. Tiny gems 
with the most delicate work of art on them no longer 
contented the Medici magnificence ; they must have 
larger objects. The same hand which could cut a 
cameo, could shape a vase out of a single magnificent 
rare stone. The laboratory of cammeists which 
Lorenzo had established in his house grew to be a 



FLORENTINE MOSAICS. 



factory of priceless vases, and was known as the 
*' Casino di S. Marco." Those beautiful chalices and 
salt-cellars of intagli on rock crystal, of sculptured 
lapis lazuli and agate, adorned with chased gold 
and smalto and precious stones, which are preserved 
in the cabinet of gems in the Uffizi, were made here. 
Eighteen of the collection have the words LAVR. 
MED. engraved on them, five of which are oriental 
sardonyx, four red jasper, two amethyst, one yellow 
Sicilian jasper, one cornelian, one coloured jasper, one 
jasper di Grigion, and one petrified wood. These 
vases, with the crystal ones by Vicentino spoken of 
above, were given by Clement VII. (Lorenzo's 
nephew) to the Church of S. Lorenzo in 1533, to 
furnish the chapel which Michael Angelo designed. 
One of the most beautiful objects in the cabinet of 
gems is a vase of jasper de Grigion in form of a 
hydra, with a golden statuette of Hercules on it. 
There is also an elegant chalice of lapis lazuli, with 
handles in the form of sphinxes ; the sides are adorned 
with a cameo of Bacchus, and one of a satyr between 
two dolphins. The most elaborate and least beautiful 
is a triumphal column in rock crystal about twenty- 
three inches high, the base supported on six agate 



1,1 6 TUSCAN STUDIES. 

lions. The pillar is covered with a spiral of the most 
microscopic intagli, celebrating the wars and victories 
of Cosimo I. ; the base has six medallion intagli of 
portraits of the captains of the army, and scenes from 
the life of Cosimo, all very crowded, tiny, and alle- 
gorical. The art is of the decline of the sixteenth 
century, so we may conclude it to be one of the last 
works produced in the Casino di San Marco. Not 
many artistic intagli were made there after that date, 
for Francesco I. turned the collection of precious 
marbles and agates to a different purpose, and thus 
gave birth to the Florentine lavori di commesso, or 
mosaic as it is called in English. 

From cutting cameos which, by managing the 
different tints in the stones, should have the appear- 
ance of raised pictures, to really making flat paintings 
in marble, was but a step. Probably the idea came 
from Milan, for there a family of marble workers 
named Sacchi had for some generations (since 151 1) 
been engaged in decorating altar fronts and chapels 
in the gorgeous Certosa of Pavia with inlaid marbles 
in the form of scrolls, flowers, and geometrical designs. 
On June nth, 1576, Gasparo Visconti wrote to 
Francesco de' Medici tellino;' him of a table made of 



FLORENTINE MOSAICS. x\^ 

oriental stones, inlaid, with a thread of gold between 
each juncture, and praising its beauty extremely. 

This was probably a work of the Sacchi family, 
and was on sale in Milan. If Francesco bought it, 
no doubt the idea of using some of the precious stones 
in the Casino in similar works was taken from this 
table, as the idea of encrusting the Medici chapel was 
taken from the Certosa of Pavia. In 1580, Duke Fran- 
cesco sent to Milan for some masters of intarsia in 
marble ; and Giovanni Bianchi, with five others under 
him, arrived to take the superintendence of the Casino. 
This arrangement did not suit the Florentines, who 
have a proverbial distrust of forestieri, as they 
call the people of another state. A letter was 
addressed to the Grand Duke by Cav. Gio. Seria- 
copi with the following complaint : " Che Maestro 
Giorgio Milanese e altri simile, non fanno altro 
che giuocare, et si serrono dentro, et mettono 
il ferro al saliscendo in modo che non si puo 
entrare senza loro volunta. Et del lavorare 
lavorano molto poco. . . . Appresso dico a V. A. S. 
che se la non remedia alle insolenzie di Maestro 
Giorgio et suo figliuolo, i quali anno cominciato a 
urtare insieme con Maestro Jacopo (Ligozzi) pittore 



1 1 8 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



di V. A. S. quale sta nel Casino si romperanno la 
testa." ^ Whether the Milanese usurpers were kept 
in their places, or whether the Florentines continued 
the work alone, we do not know; but in 1588 the 
laboratory was by Duke Ferdinando removed from 
the Casino to the Uffizi, and a Roman named Emilio 
dei Cavalieri was made superintendent of all the 
artists, intagliatori, metal workers, &c,, &c., employed 
there. This decree is dated Sept. 3, 1588. 

The Florentines were not, however, content with 
what the Milanese had taught them. It was not 
enough to encrust the walls of the Medici chapel 
with panels, scrolls, and coats of arms ; they must 
do something artistic besides, and make pictures in 
precious stones. The first inlaid picture was a like- 
ness of the late Duke Cosimo, done in 1587, when 
Ferdinand was reigning. This so pleased the Grand 

^ From the " Archivio Mediceo "; also Zobi, " Notizie Storiche sui 
lavori di commesso in Pietre dure," pp. 183, 184. Translation: "That 
the Milanese Master Giorgio, and others of his kind, do nothing but 
play ; they shut themselves up and bolt the door so that no one 
can enter without their permission. As to work, they do little of it. . . 
I will say to your Highness, that if some remedy is not found for 
the insolence of Master Giorgio and his son, who have begun to 
quarrel with Master Jacopo Ligozzi, your Highness's painter, who 
lives in the Casino, we shall have some broken heads." 



FLORENTINE MOSAICS. 119 

Duke that he ordered a portrait of Pope Clement 
VIII. to be done, which he sent to Count Bardi 
in Rome as a present, with a letter in which he 
writes : "We, having invented a new mode of repre- 
senting in inlaid marbles — not like ordinary mosaic, 
but with a more skilful artifice — the portraits of 
persons in natural colours, and true in every part of 
the face, we have had one of his Holiness done, 
which we send to your Excellency, &c., &c. From 
Poggio a Cajano, Oct. 10, 1601."^ Probably the 
time of the artists of the Casino was employed in 
these works because the contemplated chapel was 
so much delayed. The marbles must have been 
prepared before the chapel was built, for the Milanese 
masters were sent for on the first idea in 1580, but 
the real work of encrusting the chapel did not begin 
till October 20th, 161 3, according to Nigretti and 
Baldinucci. 

Not only pictures in marble were made in this 
studio, but those wonderful inlaid tables, cabinets, &c., 
which are now in the Florentine galleries and the 
Pitti Palace. Bernardo Buontalento made an ebony 
escritoire about 1558 for Don Francesco Medici. 
^ Zobi, " Notizie Storiche," &c. 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



The front was adorned with pillars of jasper, lapis 
lazuli, and clitropia (a green stone with red spots); the 
drawers were inlaid with precious stones and had 
silver intagli, representing in miniature stories of 
Minerva. The upper part had silver and gold 
termini in place of pillars, and silver miniatures of 
the beauties of the day. 

The grand ciborium intended for the INIedici chapel 
was also Buontalento's work ; it was in the form of 
a temple of the composite order, all gold and precious 
stones. Both these are now in the Pitti Palace. 

Among the artists who worked in the Casino, w^here 
we have already mentioned Ligozzi, were Giovanni 
di Bologna, Jacopo Bilivert, and Anton' Maria 
Archibusiere. These three were the only ones 
exempted from obedience to the rule of the super- 
intendent, Emilio de' Cavalieri. It was necessary to 
have some discipline, for by the time of Ferdinand 
the laboratory w^as an immense factory of art, in which 
were jewellers, miniaturists, turners, gardeners, con- 
fectioners, artists in porcelain, sculptors, painters, 
glass blowers, die sinkers, and arquebus makers, be- 
sides what the decree denominates as " cosniograffiy 

There is no doubt that this laboratory in the Uffizi 



FLORENTINE MOSAICS. 



121 



was the foundation of the existing Government 
establishment of Florentine mosaics which now has 
its seat in the Via degli Alfani." ^ 

The following is a compressed list of the stones used 
in the Florentine mosaics : 



Set I.— SILICIOUS STONES. 



STONE. 

Amethyst. 
German agate. 
Agate. 
Red agate. 
Sardonyx. 

Chalcedony of the 
Chalcedony of 



CLASS I. 

FOUND IN 
India and Brazil. 
Oberstein. 
Roman States. 
India. 
Siberia and Madagascar. 

Grisons. 
Volterra. 



COLOUR. 
Purple. 

Undulating strata. 
White with grey marks. 
Red with darker marks. 
Red and yellow, or yel- 
low and blue. 
Variegated. 
White, green, blue, &c. 



Focaie. 



CLASS II. 
England and the Casentino. A petrified conglomerate. 



\ 




CLASS III. 




Bloody 


jasper. 


Armenia. 


Dark red, or green with 
spots. 


Jasper. 




Siberia. 


Violet, or red with green 
lines. 


Jasper. 




Italy, Egypt, and Spain. 


Marked with lines, curves, 
or variegated spots. 


Jaspers. 




Sabina, Egypt, &c. 


Variegated greys. 


Ciottoli 


d' Arno. 


The Arno. 


Pebbles of shaded colours. 


Pavonazetto 


Flanders. 


Variously marked. 



^ Zobi, " Notizie Storiche," gives a list of all the stones used in 
these mosaics, and of the artists and masters employed from the 
time of Francesco I., 1574,10 Leopoldo II., 1824. 



122 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



STONE. 

Petrified wood. 



CLASS IV. 

FOUND IN 

Hungary and Black Sea. 
Set 2.— rocks. 



Granite. 


Corsica. 


Oriental granite. 


Elephant Isle. 


Egyptian granite. 


Egypt. 


Flowered granite. 


Corsica. 


Verde di Corsica. 


Corsica. 


Amazon stone. 


Amazon River. 


Porphyry. 


Antique. 


Porphyry from 


Sweden. 


Green porphyry. 


Antique. 


Serpentine. 


Antique. 


Basalt. 


Egypt. 


Breccia. 


Egypt and England 


Lapis lazuli. 


Persia and China. 



Jade. 



India, Persia, and Bohemia. 



COLOUR. 

Brown, with the marks of 
vegetable structure. 



Quartz and mica. 

Black and dark mica. 

Red and black quartz. 

Diorite with globular 
marks. 

Green. 

Blue and green felspar. 

Red with white spots. 

Light red and white. 

Green interspersed with 
crystals. 

Green with felspar crys- 
tals. 

Dark green. 

Variegated conglomerate. 

Blue, sometimes spotted 
white or brown. 

Clouded green. 



Paragone. 



Malachite. 



Set 3.— calcareous STONES. 

Flanders. Uniform black. 



Set. 4. 



Siberia. 



Bright green, marked 
white, or dark. 



There is a very interesting episode in the history of 
inlaid work in precious stones which is, I believe, not 
generally known. It refers to the supposed Floren- 
tine origin of the Indian decoration of temples and 



FLORENTINE MOSAICS. 123, 

palaces at Agra and Delhi in this style. Sig, Zobi^ 
author of " Notizie Storiche sui lavori di commesso in 
Pietre dure," is the discoverer of this link. 

Hearing a description of the Delhi mosaics and the 
Taj Mehal at Agra, from Mr. Charles Trevelyan, who 
was in Florence in 1839 on his return from India, Sig. 
Zobi, as well as Mr. Trevelyan, was much struck with 
the similitude in design and workmanship between these 
Indian mosaics or tarsia and the Florentine ones. It 
is well known that the Taj Mehal, the interior of which 
is incrusted with inlaid marbles in designs of flowers,, 
scrolls, and Etruscan vases, was the first specimen of 
this kind of work in India. In the hall of royal 
audience at Delhi is a still more remarkable subject, 
Orpheus playing a violin and surrounded by various 
beasts and birds ; it is in front of the throne. Now as 
it is not usual for Indian art to lend itself to the repre- 
sentation of nature as in these flowers ; as Etruscan 
vases are not familiar in that country, and as Maho- 
metans are not allowed to represent animated human 
figures, Sig. Zobi set himself to discover if any proof of 
Florentine artists having gone to India existed in the 
archives. 

His research was rewarded by two or three signifi- 



124 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



cant facts. The Medicean archives possess a document, 
dated 1608, which proves that Ferdinando I. demanded 
a passport for India from the king of Spain for four of 
his artists in pietre dure, to the end that they might 
go to seek and buy Oriental agates and gems, to con- 
tinue the work of inlaying the interior of the Medici 
chapel. 

Nothing is more natural than that the Mogul to 

whom they were sent desired to see a specimen of this 

work which was worth such labour in seeking materials ; 

and nothing more probable than that the art was readily 

appreciated in a country so rich in materials for it. 

Whether the four Florentines remained and founded a 

school there, leaving their designs behind them — which 

in the earlier works are free and natural, and in later 

ones more set and Oriental in design — is not easy to 

prove. Neither is it known whether the lavish monarch 

Shah Jehan, when he built the Taj Mehal in 1643, 

availed himself of the assistance of one or more of these 

Florentines, or of their native scholars, to incrust the 

interior. The fact remains that the freedom and nature 

of the designs are utterly unlike any other native art, 

which is entirelyconventional and religiously traditional. 

Mr. Trevelyan spoke of some ancient inscriptions 



FLORENTINE MOSAICS. 125 



existing in the Christian cemetery at Agra, but he could 
give no clear account of them. 

With regard to the tarsia picture which Mr. Tre- 
velyan calls Orpheus, and which is placed in front of 
the throne at Delhi, Sig. Zobi got the following infor- 
mation from Mr. Matealfe (Metcalfe ?), agent of the 
English Governor-General at Delhi, in 1841. 

The Hindoos have woven a web of mystery about 
the picture ; the figure is said to be that of Ullan Koora, 
the mother of the Tartar race, and daughter of the Star 
of Day (evidently a myth of the generating power of 
heat) ; but in that case, what significance would the 
music and listening animals have ? Besides, the figure 
is not a female, but a man draped classically in a single 
mantle of blue (lapis lazuli) lined with red (cornelian). 

Is it not more possible that the Italian workman 
made the picture of Orpheus, a god familiar to him, as 
a specimen, and that the Hindoo possessor, the Mogul, 
adapted it to his own use by giving it a native meaning? 
Doctor Bernier, author of " Memoires sur I'Empire 
du Gran Mogol" (Paris, 1 671), says that he saw the im- 
perial palace at Delhi at that time, and was struck by 
the resemblance to the Medici chapel in the cupola 
incrusted with coloured gems and marbles. 



126 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



Two other documents in the archives attest a connec- 
tion between Florence and the East. The Sopha 
(Shah) of Persia required an Italian architect, and the 
Grand Duke Cosimo II. sent Costantino de' Servi, who 
was at that time superintendent of the pietre dure 
works. 

This may not have had much connection with the 
Delhi works, especially as Costantino was again in 
Florence in the end of 1610 (the letters patent from 
■Cosimo are dated Nov. i, 1609). ^^t another deed, 
filza 54, dated in 1697, shows that Cosimo III. sent 
some artists to Goa, with a present of intarsia in pietre 
din^e from the Florentine factory, as a contribution to 
the tomb of the Jesuit saint, S. Francesco Xaverio, in 
that city. So that there was without doubt a connec- 
tion of Florentine mosaic makers with India in that 
century. 




CHAPTER V. 




Zbc Bribe's IRoom. 
-^ 

MONG the cinque-cento Florentine citizens 
who gave themselves up heart and soul 
to the worship of art, none were more 
enthusiastic and appreciative than Salvi 
and Pier Francesco Borgherini, worthy scions of an 
old family, who probably had their name from being 
dwellers in the Borgo, or suburb of S. Apostoli, in 
those ancient times when the first belt of walls made 
Florence so narrow that that street was outside the 
gates. 

The palace-building mania inaugurated by the Pitti, 
Medici, and Strozzi families, had spread through all 




•CINQUE cento" chair. 



THE BRIDES ROOM. 129 

the city, and many a burgher rebuilt his ancient 
fortress, and turned it into a " Palazzo " — that form 
of house so characteristic of the Florentine streets in 
Renaissance times. 

Of course Salvi Borgherini followed the fashion, 
and about a.d. 1500 he bethought himself of building 
a family mansion. He did not "go in" for size, like 
Luca Pitti, nor for pre-eminence in the weight of his 
building stones, like Cosimo de Medici ; but he deter- 
mined that his Palazzo should be a work of art. So he 
took counsel of an architect who was also an artist, 
by name Bartolommeo Baglione (better known in the 
annals of art as Baccio d'Agnolo). He lived in the 
Via Santa Caterina, and was not only capo maestro 
in the restoration of the Palazzo Vecchio, but the 
architect of several of the finest houses in Florence, 
the gem of his designs being the Palazzo Bartolini in 
the Piazza S. Trinita (now Hotel du Nord).^ 

Baccio gave Borgherini the designs for his house, 
and being sculptor as well as architect, he carved with 
his own hands the lintels and architraves of the doors, 

^ In 15 1 2 Baccio d'Agnolo was named capo maestro of the works 
at the Duomo, and his salary increased to twenty-five florins on 
March 31, 15 12. Gaye ii. p. 483. 



I30 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



and in the front he put a bas-rehef of the Madonna 
and Child, which is to be seen to this day, as are the 
windows he designed with the small round panes of 
glass, and their massive shutters decorated with brass 
nails. 

The carving of the chimney-piece in the hall was 
confided to a young man of great promise named 
Benedetto da Rovezzano, who had lately come to 
Florence, and of whom artists said " the marble 
became flexible as lace- work in his hands." 

In Cicognara (vol. ii. tav. 30.) an illustration of 
this chimney-piece is given, and it may be seen in its 
original state at the Palazzo del Turco in Borgo S. 
Apostoli, the ancient Borgherini palace. 

It is a fine piece of sculpture. The sides are 
composed of Raphaelesque scrolls and trophies of arms 
in relief ; the frieze across the front apparently repre- 
sents the story of the Maccabees. On the right is a 
king on his throne talking to a warrior ; on the left 
two horsemen and the statue of a man with a bow ; in 
the centre a stake and seven men burning. Above 
are two sphinxes, two geiiii, and the arms of the family 
surmounted by a vase of fire. 

So stone by stone rose the palace of the honest 




" A CINQUE CENTO " HOUSE DECORATION. 



132 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



burgher, and the impress of art was on every part. 
The house wanted a mistress, and this Pier Francesco 
supplied in his betrothal to the young Margherita 
Acciajoli, whose house was just at the back of Borghe- 
rini's, and faced the Arno. 

It was a great match for Pier Francesco, for the 
Acciajoli were one of the most important families in 
the city. Their remote ancestors (as the name implies) 
were steel-workers, who had fled from Brescia to 
escape the tyranny of Frederic Barbarossa. Some of 
them had founded the monastery of the Certosa near 
Florence, and their sculptured effigies had lain there 
for centuries beneath the low arches of the crypt. 
Margherita's father, Ruperto, was one of the eminent 
men of the time. He had in 1510 been sent as 
Ambassador to the Court of Louis XII. of France, 
and he and his family gained the privilege of carrying 
a go\d&n Jle2C7^-de-lys and the royal crown of France 
on the blue lion of their shield. In 15 13 he was 
Ambassador to Rome at the Court of Leo X., and 
in the very year of his daughter's marriage (15 15) he 
was called to Pisa to reform the University, which 
had rebelled against Florentine rule. 

Having won so eligible a bride for his son, old 



THE BRIDE'S ROOM. 133 

Salvi BorgherinI set himself to prepare a bridal 
chamber which should be worthy of her ; and the 
very best art which Florence could afford was called 
forth to decorate this shrine for the love of his son. 

Baccio d'Agnolo again took chisel in hand, and 
blocks of dark walnut wood were transformed by 
magic into the most exquisite furniture. Angels and 
loves disported themselves amidst the rich foliage on 
the great bedstead, and on the cabinets and " cassoni " 
(chests) which were to contain the wedding finery. 
The backs of the chairs and the long settees, called 
in those days " spalliere," were richly carved and inlaid 
with painted panels. The bedstead and cassoni, and 
even the walls, had similar panels ; but what precious 
panels they were ! Andrea del Sarto painted those 
for the walls. Granacci did the ones for the head and 
foot of the bedstead. Pontormo decorated the sides 
of a large cassa. Bachiacca (Francesco d'Ubertino) 
painted a long settee. And on all these things the 
same story was told in many scenes — that pathetic and 
wondrous story of Joseph. Andrea's finely painted 
pictures tell the tale of the Patriarch's childhood and his 
being sold into Egypt ; Granacci's bedstead gives his 
serving of Potiphar and prison life ; while Pontormo 



134 Ti'SCA.Y STUDIES. 

carries on the story of his greatness as Lord of Egypt, 
and Bachiacca's ''spalliere " shows his brethren bowing- 
down to him in Egypt. 

The design oi the whole was harmonious and 
exquisitely carried out, every part being a gem of art. 

The bridal bower beino: ready, the marriacre took 
place on July 15, 1515, and though we have no 
special account of it, yet from the descriptions of 
other Florentine weddings we can imagine the scene. 
A curious old painting in the Ufhzi shows how the 
wedding guests w^ere received under awnings in the 
street at the marriage of Boccaccio Adimari with Luisa 
Ricasoli in June, 1420. Sacchetti also speaks of this 
custom of o-uests assemblinq- in the street ; so Marcrhe- 
rita's wedding guests probably met on the banks of 
the Arno till the feast was ready. Here would be seen 
burghers in red luccos, knights in spurs and em- 
broidered doublets, military officials in buff, ladies in 
stiff brocades and pearls, with priests and doctors in 
black to tone down the mass of colour. Inside the 
house the feast is prepared in the great central hall, and 
here the guests are supplied with course after course of 
viands, and drink the bride's health in the wine from 
the Borgherini/<?^/<:V7. 



TUJi /l/if/J/C'S ROOM. 135 

Poets abound in Florence at this time, and sonnets 
and odes are freely interspersed between the courses. 

In the kitchen there has been of course great stress 
of business for many a day. The larders are not 
large enough to hold the wedding gifts which take the 
form of eatables. Strange cooks have been at work 
making confections and marvellous pasties which take 
all kinds of artistic forms, for in those days design 
was not confined to the painters and sculptors ; the 
very pastrycooks modelled statues in sugar, and 
temples in pie-crust, while sausages and cheese were 
materials for comic scenes. Barrels of wine have 
arrived from the country villas of the spouses ; and 
in the kitchen are huge fires, with revolving wheels, on 
which scores of fat ortolans, dozens of pigeons and 
fowls, roast all together, spitted in rows. 

At the almost contemporaneous wedding of Gualtieri 
Panciatichi and Nicola Guicciardini in May, 1507, we 
may gather some knowledge of marriage customs and 
presents, &c. 

We find that besides r i calves, 2 sheep, 3 1 couples 
of fowls and turkeys, and 63 cheeses — all given as 
presents — there were purchased for the marriage feast 
180 pairs of ortolans, 113 pairs of pigeons, 181 couples 



136 TUSCAX STUDIES. 



of poultry, 94 brace of quails, and 7 peacocks, besides 
^'$> barrels of ordinary wine and 140 flasks of Treb- 
biano.^ No wonder the larders and kitchens and the 
halls of the old palaces were large when the owners 
had to prepare such feasts as these ! 

Margherita had a full appreciation of the artistic 
beauties of her bridal home, and preserved them with 
all her housewifely care till the troublous time of the 
siege, when she had to defend them almost with her 
life. By that time she had been married fourteen 
years, and sons and daughters were growing up around 
her. During the siege in 1529 Pier Francesco was 
away on some civic business at Lucca, so Margherita 
had to fight for her household gods alone ; and bravely 
she did so. 

The King of France (Francis I.) carried his patron- 
age of Italian art so far that he became to cinque-cento 
Italy what Napoleon was early in the nineteenth cen- 
tury — the despoiler. 

His agent in Florence was a certain Giovan-Battista 

della Palla, who thought to curry favour with a great 

power by laying his hands on many a precious work 

of art to send to Paris, He had long cast his eyes on 

^ From "La Famiglia Panciatichi," by Conte L. Passerini. 



THE BRIDES ROOM. 137 

Margherita's chamber, and coveted its unique furniture 
to adorn a room at Versailles — which he promised 
King Francis should surpass every room in the world ,•; 
and he so worked on the Signoria as to obtain their 
consent to purchase the Borgherini treasures, and 
present them to Francis I. as a gift from the Signoria 
of Florence. Armed with this permission, Giovan- 
Battista della Palla went forthwith to the house in 
Borgo S. Apostoli with his proposals. But Margherita 
was equal to the occasion ; her loyalty did not feel 
called upon to adorn her enemies' palaces, even at the 
command of the Signoria. 

"You are a bold man, Messer Giovan-Battista," she 
said, **vile broker that you are, to despoil the rooms of 
gentlemen, and to rob the city of its richest and most 
revered treasures to beautify the land of strangers and 
our enemies. I do not wonder at you, low man and 
traitor as you are, but at the magistrates of this city 
who allow you to act so vilely. This furniture that 
you covet to make money out of was my marriage gift 
from Salvi, my father-in-law, and I revere it for his 
memory, and my love for his son, and with my life and 
blood, if need be, I will defend it. 

" Leave this house with- your villainies, Giovan- 



138 TUSCAX SrUD/ES. 



Hattista. and go to those who soiu you and say that 
I will not have a sino-le thino" moved, and if thev want 
to make presents lo King* Francis lei them despoil 
their own houses — and — never dare you to enter this 
door again." 

Delia Palla was so intimidated by this burst ot 
native eloquence that he retired ; and the Borgherini 
treasures remained in the hands of their rightful 
possessors. Margherita's descendants were not equally 
reverent towards their /tv/<?A\c. for the beautiful things 
are now scattered far and wide. Two of Andrea del 
Sarto's panels and two of Pontormo's are in the 
Florentine Galleries, for Niccolo Borgherini — INIar- 
gherita's grandson — sold them to the Grand Duke 
Francesco in 15S4. For those of Andrea he was paid 
360 ducats, and for Pontormo's 00 ducats. Nothing 
remains of the bride's home but the carvings ol Baccio 
d'Agnolo o\er the doors, and the chimney-piece of 
Rovezzano, which is still in its place in the old 
house, now Palazzo del Turco in Borgo S. Apostoli. 

It is believed that a beautiful Madonna which 
Andrea del Sarto painted for a member of the same 
family — Giovanni Borgherini — is now in the possession 
of Major Oliver Dav Stokes, of Cheltenham. 



THE JiRWE'S ROOM. 



139 



Vasari describes it as "a Madonna, with a St. John 
giving a hall, emblematizing the world, to the infant 
Christ, and a fjne head of St. Joseph." Sig. Milanesi, 
the annotator of Vasari, says he saw the painting in a 
private house in Florence, where it was offered for sale 
in 1852. 

'i'wo panels of the story of Joseph are in the collec- 
tion of luirl Cowper at Panshanger ; but these are 
more probably the ones painted by Andrea and Pon- 
tormo for the monks of S. Gallo, and not connected 
with the Porgherini series. 











CHAPTER VI. 



.%'Y^v^lK''UT a mile west of Florence is an olive- 
.^^"^avT-n: covered hill, crowned with cvpresses. be- 
'o ^- v\\^ neath whose shadow stands all that remains 
of the ancient convent of Mom Olivoto. 
Invalided soldiers now occupy the cells : the cypress 
avenue is closed and gxass grown : the refectory, divided 
into several rooms, now forms the house of the one 
frate who does duty in the church. To the artistic 
taste of this monk. Don Alfonso Focacci. Florence 
owes the re-discovery of a treasure, mutilated it is true, 
but a treasure even in its decay — the remains of a 
frescoed '"Cenacolo" once adorning the refectory. 
Some two years ago. the priest by chance knocked a 



A RECOVERED FRESCO. 141 

bit of yellow stencilled plaster off his wall, and finding 
traces of colour beneath, he carefully uncovered the 
whole length, and half the cenacolo came to light, the 
one end being irretrievably lost, as the wall itself 
has been cut away. The figures on this side were 
much ruined, but the central portion remains entire. 
Even here the destroyer's hand has done irreparable 
damage : the heads of our Saviour and St. John are 
almost featureless, but those of St. Peter and Judas 
are in better preservation, and are characteristic 
enough to prove the authorship as that of Gian 
Antonio de Bazzi, known as Sodoma. 

Signore Milanesi and the Commission of Art have 
arrived at this conclusion chiefly from internal evidence, 
but this to those who know Bazzi's works is over- 
whelming. The dark, sinister face of Judas, so passion- 
ate and rich in colouring, is almost a reproduction of 
some figures of Goths in the St. Benedict frescoes at 
Monte Oliveto Maggiore, near Siena, and reveals the 
same technical treatment of hair and flesh tints as the 
Christ of the Belle Arti at Siena. 

The colouring too, has all Bazzi's own daring. St. 
Peter's drapery is a miasterly combination of the three 
primaries, only possible to an artist under the influence 



143 TO'SCAA Sn/I?I£S. 



of the Venetian school : the Christ is in purple and 
blue. The artist's realistic tendency comes out in his 
conception of Judas : the face is sinister, keen, and 
covetous, but is turned away from the gaze of his 
INIaster ; his worldly character is emphasized by the 
secular style of dress, quite unlike the religious draper}' 
of the other apostles ; the purse hanging on his hand. 
and even the less decorous attitude, distinguish him 
from the saintly figures around. Another little bit o{ 
realism is the salt-cellar overturned, evidently by the 
hand of Judas. 

So much for internal evidence. Direct documentar}- 
proofs are unfortimately wanting, for Signore Milanesi 
has searched the archives of the order, but finds that 
the books of the " cellaria " or general expenses are 
missing, and the building or decorative payments are 
not entered in the household books of the convent. 
The points which would go far to prove the proba- 
bility of Bazzi being the artist are the following. The 
head of the Olivetan Order at that time was a Fra 
Domenico da Lecco — who had known Bazzi in Lom- 
bardy, and employed him not only at the great convent 
^lonte Oliveto Maggiore, but also at a smaller one 
called St. Anna, in Creta. near Pienza, where he 



A RECOVERED FRESCO. 143 



painted the refectory. It is therefore very probable 
that the same artist who had given satisfaction in two 
convents of the order, should have been employed at 
the third — Monte Oliveto at Florence. That he was 
in the city is certain, as a document proves him to 
have been ill in the hospital of Santa Maria Nuova in 
Florence in 1527, when he occupied bed No. 42. "^ 
No artist has suffered more at the hands of an envious 
biographer than Bazzi in those of Vasari, who has not 
even deigned to give him his right name, calling him 
Razzi, of which cognomen not the smallest proof 
remains. It is time that some justice should be done 
to a man whose works are so deserving of fame. The 
question of his birth, as I have said elsewhere,- may 
be considered settled. Padre Luigi Bruzzi finds, in 
the archives of Vercelli, that in 1477 a son, Giovan 
Antonio, was born to Jacopo d' Antonio de' Bazzi and 
Angelina da Bergamo his wife ; and that on Nov. 28, 
1490, this boy was placed as a scholar in the bottega 
of Martino Spanzotti, a painter of Casale, near Ver- 
celli. In 1497, his father being dead, he went for 
some years to Lombardy, and finally in 1501 arrived 

* Milanesi " Commentario sul Vasari," vol. vi. p. 4. 
^ "Renaissance of Art in Italy," p. 291. 



144 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



in Siena, with which city his name is indissolubly 
connected. As proof of his stay in Lombardy, we 
have the patronage of Fra Domenico da Lecco, who 
had known him there and employed him in Siena; and 
the fact that he was induced to go to Siena by the 
Spannocchi family, who had a bank in Lombardy. 
Thus the varied influences apparent in his painting 
are accounted for. Formed in the school and land of 
Titian, his colouring has all the Venetian daring and 
richness ; his flesh tints are warm, and have an Eastern 
glow such as Giorgione gives to his canvasses. Taken 
successively from thence to Lombardy and Tuscany, 
he grafts on this colouring a delicacy of design equal 
to Leonardo da Vinci and Luini, with a grace of 
drapery clearly Raphaelesque. 

As evidence that his surname was Bazzi and not 
Razzi, his receipt for the dote of his wife, Beatrice del 
Gain, is signed Johannes Antonius Jacobi de Bazis, Oct. 
28, 1 5 10; and another document securing to him the 
possession of a house he had bought In Terza Camollia, 
in the parish of S. Donati, Siena, gives his name and 
titles as follows — Magnlfico et generoso equiti domino 
Joanni Antonio Jacobi de BazIs, pictori de Verze 
alias el Sogdoma. 



A RECOVERED FRESCO. 145 

Vasari says he was despised by all, and a penniless 
spendthrift, and that his wife had to leave him and 
support herself. If this be true, what means the 
" equiti domino " above, how comes it that several 
letters pass, in 1537 (see Gaye's " Carteggio," vol. ii. 
pp. 265-268), between the Signoria of Siena and 
the Prince of Piombino, the first of whom wants 
him back in Siena, and the second detains him at his 
palace '^. In these he is spoken of with respect as 
Cavalier Sodoma, and there is, further, a letter addressed 
to himself by the Signoria, which begins " Generoso 
Cavaliere," and urges him to return and finish the 
frescoes in the chapel of the Piazza. As to his wife not 
being able to live with him, she was certainly with him 
in 1531 and 1541 ; and so far from being a spendthrift, 
he bought a second house in 1534, and gave a good 
dote to his daughter, who married one of his scholars, 
Bartolommeo Riccio. 

Bizzarre he mie^ht have been, with his talking raven 
and collection of undomestic animals ; but so also 
were Paolo Uccelli and Pier di Cosimo before him. 
His running races in the Palio might have seemed 
to his biographer unworthy the dignity of a serious 
artist ; but his contemporary Albertinelli has kept his 

10 



146 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



fame undimmed, though given to the same kind of 
exercises. 

Let Bazzi be judged as an artist by the evidence of 
his works, and not a h'ne or an expression will be 
found unworthy of the highest art. 

He understood woman's feelings in all their purity, 
as witness the exaltation of soul in the "Ecstasy of 
St. Catherine," and the tenderness of feeling in the 
" Salutation " in the Oratory of San Bernardino, where 
he gives a new interpretation to the greeting. The 
mother of St. John falls on her knees before the Virgin, 
as if recognizing the greater honour of her coming 
maternity. In the " Nativity," once at Lecceto, now 
in the Belle Arti, Siena, the expression of religious joy 
and adoration is even more exalted than in Correggio's 
well-known and similar rendering of the subject. 

One of Bazzi's greatest distinctions is his love of 
truth. His Holy Families are not as those of many 
artists, idealized portraits of contemporaries ; they are 
by him represented as they were in reality — an Eastern 
household ; — the rich complexioned Orientals in the 
"Nativity" in the church of St. Agostino, and the 
figures beneath the exquisite "Coronation" in St. 
Bernardino, are specimens of this. The modelling of 



A RECOVERED FRESCO. 147 

the Adam and St. Joseph in the latter is splendid ; 
the flesh tints are Sodoma's very own — warm, living, 
and Eastern. In contrast to these, the spirituality of 
the upper portion of this painting comes out with 
double refinement. The Virgin, a lovely modest 
figure in graceful white robes, kneels among the 
clouds, while Christ crowns her, and angels and 
cherubim hover adoring around. 

But Bazzi's greatest masterpieces are his conceptions 
of Christ. In his " Saviour on the Mount of Olives " 
— now in the Belle Arti, Siena — the figure of the 
kneeling Christ is replete with the majesty of the 
King of Sorrows ; so noble is the form that even 
the angel loses dignity beside it. In the " Christ in 
Hades " the attribute is triumphant power ; but the 
grandest inspiration of all is the fragment from the 
" Flagellation," consisting of the one figure of the 
Saviour. If Sodoma had never painted anything but 
this broken fragment, he would still have been famous 
for ever. What the whole fresco must have been we 
have no means of judging. No doubt the figures 
whose upraised arms are visible with their scourges 
were coarse men suitable to their office, and one feels 
thankful they have disappeared, leaving the Man of 



TUSCAN STUDIES. 



Sorrows alone in his overwhelming- grief. There is 
that in the face, which no Christian can look on un- 
moved. The " St. Catherine " series in S. Domenico, 
and the St. Sebastian now in the Uffizi, Florence, both 
prove how well he understood the refining power of 
faith ; while his largest works, the " St. Benedict " series 
at Monte Oliveto Maggiore, show his concentration, 
power of grouping, and graphic manner of telling a 
story. Any one who has not seen these, has yet to 
become acquainted with a great painter. All his 
technical excellences are to be studied here — his 
robust daring colouring, harmony of composition, vivid 
life and expression, and his faithfulness to truth in 
nature. His Goths are fierce barbarians, his saints 
spiritual beings ; and if only the fresco of which we 
give an illustration were as well preserved, the same 
signs would be found, as the head of St. Peter and 
figure of Judas testify. We have in Bazzi not the 
slave of an ideal conventionality as was Perugino, not 
the exquisite adaptor of contemporaneous life to Scrip- 
ture stories as Andrea del Sarto ; but one who is able 
to grasp and show forth the varied truths of both 
nature and spirit — giving the spirituality of the saint 
and the materiality of the sinner with equal fidelity. 



CHAPTER VII. 



H nbuseum of pictorial XCapestr^. 




LORENCE has added another page to the 
history of Art which she contains within 
her walls, by the Museum of Tapestry 
and Needlework recently opened in the 
upper floor of the Palazzo della Crocetta, the site of 
the Etruscan and Egyptian Museums. 

Tapestry weaving was one of the distinctive arts 
of Florence at that time when the busy fingers and 
refined taste of her citizens evolved artistic forms out 
of every material they touched, be it marble or canvas, 
stone or silk, wood or precious stones. Like most of 
the arts of the Renaissance, this also was brought 



I50 



TCrSCAA" ST(/ni£S, 



from the East at the time of the Crusades, took root 
in France and Germany, and reached its culmination 
in Italy. The story may be brietly traced in its 
successive names, Sarazinois. Arras, and Tapestry. 
The eariier English and French tapestries, such as 
the :c7«? (it'/>icfa of Dagobert in the church of St. Denis 
in the sixth century, the Auxerre embroidered hang- 
ings in 840. and the Ba)-eux tapestry o\ Matilda, do 




OK SOLOMON. 11.KM1SU TAVKSPKY. 



not enter into this history, as they were not woven 
but worked with a needle, as were also the Byzantine 
ones. The Flemish factories began in the twelfth 
century, and those of Arras in Picard)' flourished in 
the fourteenth and fifteenth. 

The hfteenth century was a great period of emigra- 
tion for Flemish artists and artizans. Probably they 
were driven abroad by religious or political persecu- 



A MUSEUM OF PICIORIAL TAPJiSTRV. 151 

tions, but it is a fact, that about the same time that 
the workmen of Johann Faust were estabHshing print- 
ing presses all over Italy, Flemish tapestry weavers 
were also setting up looms in her principal cities. 
The Gonzaghi employed them at Mantua in 14 19, the 
Venetians in 142 1 ; other Flemings settled in Siena 
and Bologna. Not till 1455 did Pope Nicholas en- 
courage them in Rome, and a certain Livino de' Gilii 
came to Plorence about the same time, to be succeeded 
towards the end of the century by Johann, son of 
Johann. The curious old frieze of tapestry, illustrating 
the Song of vSolomon, of which we give a specimen, 
might have been the work of one of these early 
weavers, and the Baptism of Christ (No. 66, Museo 
degli Arazzi) a slightly later one. Of the same style 
were probably the " Spalliera da cassa," spoken of in 
the Inventory of Lorenzo de' Medici, of which one 
represented a chase and another a tournament. 

But the chief treasures of the new museum were 
made after the time of Cosimo I., who, in 1545, 
engaged several Flemish weavers, and established a 
school in Florence. The documents still exist ^ which 
set forth the agreement between Pier Francesco 
' Archivio di State. Fascio G. 299. 



1 52 TUSCA N S7 UDIES. 



Riccio, as major-domo of Duke Cosimo, and the two 
principal manufacturers, Johann Roost and Nicolo 
Karcher, both of whom had previously worked in 
Ferrara. The contract with Johann Roost, dated 
September 3, 1548, obliges him to keep twenty-four 
looms, and as many more as needful, at work ; to 
teach the art of weaving arras, of dyeing wool and 
silk, and spinning wool, silk, and gold, &c., to any 
Florentine youths who should be placed under his 
instruction — the instruction to be gratis, but the pupils 
to keep themselves. The Duke engages to furnish 
looms and necessaries, and to pay Roost the annual 
salary of five hundred scudi in gold. 

The contract with Karcher, November 17, 1550, 
is precisely similar in tenor, but he is only obliged to 
keep eighteen looms, and receives a salary of two 
hundred scudi. Both these documents are renewals 
of old contracts made three or four years previously, 
and rendered necessary by the increased press of 
business, and greater number of pupils. 

It was not likely that the Italians would for long 
accept Flemish Art in their tapestries. No ! They 
only took from the foreigners the mere handicraft, and 
impressed it with their own artistic taste. Before 



A MUSEUM OF PICTORIAL TAPESTRY. 155 

long, all the chief artists of the Academy of St. Luke 
became designers for the weavers of Arazzi. Vasari's 
friend, Salviati, gave the cartoons for the " Deposition 
from the Cross " (Museum, No. 1 1 1), which was woven 
by Roost in 1552, and for " Ecce Homo," and a 
" Resurrection " by Karcher, in 1553. 

The work seems to have been distributed pretty 
equally between the two factories. Of twenty pieces 
of tapestry representing the history of Joseph, and 
woven between 1547 and 1550, nine were executed in 
the looms of Roost, and eleven by those of Karcher ; 
while of Bachiacca's four cartoons of the Months, three 
of them were woven by Roost and one by Karcher, 
who at the same time made another hanging, of 
grotesque subjects, from a cartoon by the same master. 
The very pictorial and allegorical style thrown into 
the tapestry by the Italian artists may be seen in 
their painting of the Months (December, January, and 
February), with the border, which is a mixture of 
mythology, grotesqueness, and classicality. Roost's 
signature was very curious ; the Italians having named 
him Rosto (roast), he took as his anagram a piece of 
meat on the spit. Karcher's sign was a monogram. 
About the year 1553 Roost was at work on the fine 



T54 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



pieces, "Justice liberating Innocence," and "Flora" 
{Museum, Nos. 122, 123). The two episodes in the 
life of Caesar (Nos. 88 and 89) were of about the same 
date, but came from the factory at Bologna, whence 
Cosimo purchased them. They show a more German 
style in design. 

Besides improving the artistic value of Flemish 
arras, the Italians rendered it also richer and more 
gorgeous in material. The Flemish work was entirely 
in wool and thread, the Venetian and Florentine hang- 
ings are rich in glowing tints of silk and gleams of 
gold thread. The style used by all the masters of the 
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries was the haute lisse, 
or "high warp," in which the frame, with its horizontal 
threads, was placed upright, and the pattern so far 
behind it that the weaver could walk round and 
examine his work from the back. In basse lisse the 
frame lies close on the pattern, and is woven entirely 
on the face of the work. The method in either case is 
similar, the alternate horizontal threads are lifted with 
the treadle, and so much of it is woven with one 
colour, as the pattern indicates. A kind of comb is 
used to press the perpendicular threads together, 
and all the holes which occur at the junction of 



A MUSEUM OF PICTORIAL TAPESTRY. 155 

two colours horizontally arf; sewn together after- 
wards. 

Karcher ceased to work in J 553, and Roost was 
buried in San Lorenzo in 1563, after which we hear 
of no more Flemings. The youths they had been 
obliged to train became masters in their stead, Bene- 
detto Squilli taking the factory in Via dei Servi, and 
Giovanni Sconditi that in Via del Cocomero. A little 
later Guaspari Papini united the two, and in his turn 
engaged artists to draw his cartoons, 

Alessandro Allori gave the designs for Nos. 26, 28, 
and -^-x^ in the new museum, representing scenes from 
the life of Christ, and also for the six magnificent 
pieces of the "Story of Phaeton," woven by Papini 
between the years 1587 and 162 1. Cigoli supplied 
those for the " Christ before Herod" and others, while 
Bernardino Poccetti was constantly employed by the 
firm. 

The Florentine manufactory declined a little during 
the reigns of Ferdinand I. and Cosimo II., while that 
of France, which had revived by its influence, made 
immense progress. Just as the Italians imported the 
technical art from Flanders, the French imported their 
artistic beauty from Italy. Primaticcio was employed 



156 TUSCAN STUDIES. 



to draw cartoons for the weavers of Francis I. ; 
nor did Raphael himself disdain to draw for them, as 
the cartoons at Hampton Court testify ; GiuHo Romano 
was also employed: and Henri IV., in 1597, invited 
to France not only artists, but weavers in silk and 
gold. To this Italian influence we may date the rise 
of the Gobelins, which so far outvied the mother fabric 
that Ferdinand II., Grand Duke of Tuscany, sought 
to revive the Florentine manufactory by employing a 
Parisian named Pierre Fevere, to whom a o^reat number 
of the tapestries in the new museum are owing, the 
most original of which are the allegorical pieces of 
Day, Night, Winter, and Summer. 

I do not know whether it was from motives of 
economy, or from the difficulty of finding good 
artists in the beginning of the seventeenth century^ 
when Art was low in Florence, but Fevere seems to 
have worked more from copies of the older masters 
than from original cartoons. Thus we find tapestries 
of his from Michael Angelo, Del Sarto, Cigoli, and 
other artists. He did not even disdain to copy an 
old tapestry of Karcher's, the " Month of May." To 
Fevere and Papini, clever as they were, may probably 
be dated the decline of tapestry as arras proper. 



A MUSEUM OF PICTORIAL TAPESTRY. 157 

They so imitated oil-paintings, that their tapestries 
were framed and used as paintings would have been — 
the old office of clothing the walls was superseded ; in 
ceasing to be a branch of decorative art, and aiming 
at pictorial effect, tapestry fell. 

After Fevere, Giovan Battista Termini became the 
director of the Florentine factory : but he lived in 
stormy times ; the workmen split into factions, one 
side advocating the haute lisse, the other the basse 
lisse. He, however, would not hear of the latter 
innovation, and was so persecuted that he had to 
fly from Florence. His successor, Antonio Bronconi, 
had some good workmen under him, but their tapes- 
tries are all ruined by the affectations and bad drawing 
of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as witness 
the "Four Quarters of the Globe" and the "Four 
Elements," in the museum. 

In 1737 the manufacture in Florence was finally 
closed, after a career of nearly three hundred years. 
Besides the visible history of her own progress in the 
art, Florence enshrines in her museum some of the 
finest works from the Gobelins, such as the series of 
"■ Scenes from the life of Esther," those delightful 
pieces of " Children Gardening," and a very fine series, 



158 



Tl/SCA^^ STUDIES. 



" Adam and Eve." from a Flemish manufactory. These 
latter have become historically interesting to modern 
work-a-day Florence, as having been for centuries 
connected with the bygone days of fcstc. They were 
always hung in the Loggia dei Lanzi on St. Johns 
Day and the /IVc' of Corpus Domini, while other series 
of Samson and St. John Baptist adorned the facade 
of the Palazzo Vecchio. 

There are several rooms in the museum set apart 
for antique needlework and old brocades and costumes. 




PART II. 

TUSCAN SKETCHES. 



CHAPTER I. 

Zhc Dintage. 




STRANGE fancy has taken the Countess 
Benveduti this year. She has as many 
villas scattered through the rich valley of 
the Arno as she can count on the fingers 
of her white hands — villas large and comfortable, 
villas artistic and beautiful ; but this year nothing will 
please her but to hold her great vintage party in the 
very oldest and most dilapidated of them all. 

The Villa Vecchia Benveduti — as it is called to dis- 
tinguish it from the more modern heritages of the 
family — stands up like a great fortress, with its solid 
walls of Tuscan architecture and swallow-tail battle- 



II 



THE VINTAGE. 163 



ments, on a hill overlooking the southern part of the 
Val d'Arno, where Florence shines, a heap of palaces 
and towers on a silver stream. Although no Benve- 
duti has lived in the Villa Vecchia for a hundred years 
or more, a long line of their ancestors had made it 
a home for centuries before that ; and time has been 
kind to it, for the ancient furniture of carved wood 
is still solid, and the rich brocaded silk hangings still 
cover the walls, with their colours softened by the 
sunny years as they have passed. 

The aroma of the eighteenth century lingers yet 
about the rooms, where curious old backgammon 
boards, and ancient cards in painted boxes are on the 
gilded tables of the Sala, and the portraits on the 
walls show wigs and embroidered coats ; and where 
" peruke stands " stretch out empty arms beside the 
blurred mirrors in carved frames on the dressing- 
tables, and the heavy canopied bedstead holds its 
sway in majestic gloom in the chambers. The wigs 
are worn in a different guise now, and are not so 
easily hung on a stand at night. 

But to return to the Countess's " Vendemmia." 
There are wide vineyards sloping down the hills and 
covering the terraces round the Villa Vecchia with 



i64 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

gracious festoons of vivid leafage, between the dim 
and dusky olives. Beneath the olives and fruit-bowed 
peach trees, wave the wide green blades of the maize 
with its rows of purplish feathers. The podere is 
a rich one, and has always been famed for its " vin- 
santoT Of course it would give the Countess a great 
deal less trouble to have her party at one of her more 
modern villas, where everything is in readiness to re- 
ceive visitors ; but she is a lady who delights in a new 
sensation of any sort, and when she has taken a fancy 
into her head, does not mind giving any amount of 
trouble to gratify it. A vintage party pre-supposes 
a dinner and a supper. The kitchens at the Villa 
Vecchia are large and cavernous enough to cook for 
a hundred guests, and the banqueting-hall has room to 
seat them ; but in the one place, the frying-pans and 
gridirons have the rust of ages encrusted on them, 
and the oaken cabinets of the other only contain a few 
grand old majolica plates and dishes, very fine but 
not convenient. So for nearly a week past, red- 
wheeled barrocci — the framework which in Tuscany 
does duty for a cart — and more cumbrous ox-waggons 
have been toiling up the hill laden with culinary 
utensils and table furniture. 



THE VINTAGE. 165 



To-day the winding road from the valley shows 
different travellers : a succession of family equipages 
with solemn horses and grave coachmen, of open 
cabs full of English or French faces, of more modest 
baghere — little chaises drawn by the fleet Tuscan 
ponies which, though famous for speed, are totally 
devoid of paces. These latter vehicles bring up 
stout "fattori" (bailiffs) from the other villas, with 
their portly wives, whose white bodices are relieved 
by a wealth of jewellery about them. Long coral 
necklaces hang on their bosoms, tight-fitting rows 
of pearls shine round their brown necks, long gaudy 
earrings quiver in their ears, and rings reach to the 
middle joints of their fingers. Their daughters are 
smaller editions of the mothers, with cheeks as rosy 
as their corals, and eyes as bright as diamonds. 
They wear their glossy hair piled in coils round their 
neat heads, and veiled beneath a most becoming 
mantilla. 

The varied company arrive ; are set down on the 
great grassy terrace, bordered with a low wall with 
dilapidated statues on it, which does duty for a lawn ; 
and here the Countess receives them, giving her hand 
and cheek equally to the aristocratic visitors and the 



i66 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

buxom fattoresse. The former touch each cheek in 
a salute ; the latter either do the same, or, with m.ore 
humility, bend and kiss her hand. 

The Contessine Amalia and Irene, daughters of 
the hostess, in broad-brimmed Tuscan hats looped up 
with roses, and white dresses very much flounced, look 
like the nymphs on a " Ginori " vase, with the pleasing 
addition of lively manners and bright eyes. 

"Now, you know, you have all come to work,'* 
laughs the Contessina Amalia to a group of English 
girls who are sitting on the low wall gazing their fill 
at the Val d'Arno spread out below them, covered 
only with the filmy veil of noonday heat. 

" Oh yes ! we are quite ready — only tell us where 
to go and what to do," exclaims one fair girl. 

" I begin to feel quite classical already at the very 
sight of those contadini with their antique pails of 
grapes on their shoulders, it is like one of the idylls 
of Horace ! " exclaims a young lady in spectacles and 
short hair, whom it is whispered is a Girton B.A. 

" They look as if they had stepped bodily out of 
Benozzo Gozzoli's fresco of Noah and his family," 
says a third who is an art student. 

" First of all, you must call those modern pails 



THE VINTAGE. 167 



bigonce,''' smiles Contessina Amalia ; "and next you 
must be supplied with basket and scissors, for I see 
you have not come provided." 

" The result of English ignorance, you see," says 
the Girton girl. 

" Next," went on Amalia, " a cavalier will be neces- 
sary." 

On this the English eyes open wide — " A cavalier ?" 

" Yes — who is to hold your basket, and run and 
empty it when full, and pick the grapes above your 
head and talk to you, and " 

" In fact, do all the work, or help you to play," 
interrupts the sensible fair girl. " I and the cavalier 
would find each other bores in a quarter of an hour." 

At this moment Contessina Irene appears from the 
huge door of the house with a number of pairs of 
scissors, each hung on red braid, and half a dozen 
dainty little baskets. The daughter of the fattoressa 
follows with a pile of baskets of more solid and use- 
ful form. The sensible English girl immediately 
seizes the largest of these, and possessing herself of 
a pair of scissors, which she hangs round her waist, 
marches off energetically to work without waiting the 
third of the necessary adjuncts. 



i6S TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

"Signer JNIazzadura," exclaims the Contessina 
Amalia, " will you initiate the Signorina Ellison into 
the mysteries of grape-gathering. You can at the 
same time study the mysteries of the English lan- 
guage and character," she added sotto^ voce, with a 
mischievous twinkle in her eye. 

Introductions follow briskly, much as in a ball-room, 
only instead of the stereotyped "May I have the 
pleasure," &c., the cavalier begs the honour of carry- 
ing the ladies' baskets. Some girls go off in groups 
by themselves, the matrons following in pairs ; the 
paterfamilias generally declines to work in the sun, 
and lights a cigar in a cool arbour or under a shady 
pergola, where he talks politics or finance with his 
compeers. 

" Don't introduce me to any of your forestieri^' 
whispers a handsome young man to Amalia. " I 
have reserved for myself the hope of carrying your 
basket for you." 

"If you promise not to make me idle, you may do 
so," she smiles ; and they too disappear leisurely after 
the rest, leaving me alone on the terrace, studying the 
Italian vineyard in its midday aspect from beneath 
the shade of a huge, thick-lined parasol. 



170 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

The vineyard beneath me stretches out in ail its 
luxuriant width and breadth ; there the vine garlands 
wreath and festoon from apple tree to maple, and wed 
the olive to the mulberry, for this is one of the old- 
fashioned poderi, where the straight, low espaliers of 
the French viniculture have not yet intruded to do 
away with the careless beauty of the classic vineyard. 
Every garland is rich with white or purple clusters ; 
they nestle up in the highest branches, and trail down 
the tree trunks to the cracked and parched ground. 

Here and there are fields of maize, the wide green 
blades of which have been stripped off to feed the 
cattle in the grassless summer months, and the ruddy 
bunches of corn have ripened in their yellow leafy 
husks. But not many of these swelling bundles are 
left in the ground now, for there are rich-coloured 
piles of Indian corn heaped up on the aja just below 
me, and the peasant children are rolling about in them 
as a little diversion from their appointed task of 
stripping them of their husks. 

The aja or threshing-floor has arched sheds round 
it, which are filled with red-shafted carts, oil-jars like 
those in which Ali Baba's thieves were hidden, piles 
of unwashed wine-barrels tapering at both ends like 



THE VINTAGE. 171 



the old Roman ones which held Horace's falernian 
wine, and a primitive plough or two lying useless and 
waiting for rain to soften the ground. 

What would English labourers say to the Italian 
plough ! It is just a piece of the trunk or root of 
a tree, with a sharp spur or branch on one side which 
answers the purpose of a plough-share. 

On the low wall of the aja a row of wicker-work 
hurdles are lying, with a quantity of figs cut open and 
spread to dry in the sun. Then a succession of brown 
earthern pans, where a dark red mixture is drying — 
this is the tomato preserve to flavour the soups and 
macaroni in the winter. 

The aja, always the centre of farm work, is espe- 
cially full and busy to-day. An ox-cart has just come 
up with a large tub, or tino, on it, and in the tino 3. 
man red to his knees with the blood of the wounded 
grapes, which he is treading underfoot, and crushes, as 
the white oxen drag the cart slowly up the hill, their 
meek heads swaying beneath the yoke, and looking at 
all who meet them with large pathetic eyes. There is in 
the eyes of these animals an expression of depth and 
mystery which recalls to one's mind all the ancient 
myths, how they lent their form to the gods, and one 



172 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

thinks instructively of lo flying to her Egyptian home. 
The divinity of Isis and Astarte still lingers in the 
eyes and horns of these speechless creatures whose 
heads are bowed to labour. 

The oxen push the cart, with its frothing load of 
bruised grapes, back into an archway beneath the 
terrace on which I stand, and soon I see nothing but 
two white heads, with crimson tassels across the fore- 
heads, framed in the blackness of a foreshortened 
arch. 

Down in the podei^e, merry groups of workers are 
gleaming in the brilliant sunshine. Men in wide hats, 
bare feet and coloured shirt-sleeves, carry the tall 
wooden pails called bigouce, filled with grapes, to the 
large tubs or tini on the ox- waggons in the grassy road. 
Groups of girls, in gay-tinted skirts and particoloured 
bodices, cut off the clusters from the festooning vines 
to fill their baskets, which they empty into the nearest 
bigoncia. The children fill tiny baskets, and toddle 
across the rough ground to empty them ; but their 
bunches are very much mutilated, for it is a part of 
the ceremony to eat all the time. A sturdy young 
monkey of a boy, with bare legs, has given himself up 
entirely to this enjoyment, for he is lying full length 



THE VINTAGE. 17: 



under a huge bunch of purple grapes, letting them 
drop one by one into his mouth. 

And the background to all this classic rusticity \ 
The picturesque profile of a hill rounding off 
to the left, with a convent on its summit, a row 
of cypresses marking its undulating form as it sinks 
into the valley. Those cypresses stand up darkly 
against the far-off hills of Monte Morello and Monte 
Murlo behind — hills of rounded but rugged forms, 
softened into beauty by tender blue mists in gradating 
shades. On the right, the white villas which stud the 
whole landscape seem to gather into a focus round a 
great dome, just as crystals combine round a nucleus, 
and the crowded crystals shoot up into spires and 
beautiful towers in the midst. This is Florence, and 
all around her are miles of dusky olives, relieved 
with dark pines and green trees, and softened off 
into undulating hills. 

Shouts of laughter and snatches of song reach me 
from below, for vintage is a merry time, and the 
peasants carol their stornelli gaily as they gather in 
the ruby harvest. More refined voices sound nearer 
me, but none of the amateur grape gatherers are to 
be seen. Where are they all ? We must find them. 



174 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

Immediately below the house is a long pergola, or 
trellis walk, covered with vines ; smaller shady arbours, 
equally rich in fruit, branch off from it. It is here that 
the oruests are assembled, for the real labour in the sun 
is left to the peasants, and the guests only do a little 
work in the coolest spots, and the work is as orna- 
mental as their baskets. 

The Contessa Clementina de' Barbeneri has filled 
her elegant receptacle, and whiles away the time till 
some one comes to relieve her of it, by lounging on a 
garden seat and eating the contents — a convenient way 
of lio^htenino" her burden. The Enoflish o-irls awake 
the amazement of their southern companions by 
really working. The energy with which they snip off 
the bunches, springing or climbing to reach them, is to 
the lovers of ease most astonishing. They decline 
troubling the gentlemen to carry their baskets, but run 
to and fro and empty them into the tall bigonce, placed 
at each end of t\\Q pergola. 

The Contessina Amalia has found a more diverting 
occupation. Her handsome friend has climbed up the 
trellis, and drops the purple bunches into her out- 
spread hands beneath. Her uplifted face seems 
especially interesting to him, and if the grapes drop 



THE VINTAGE. 175 



through her fingers now and then it is not to be 
wondered at. However, not a great deal of flirting 
can be done, for there are mothers, and aunts, and 
duennas at all points, as an Italian girl is never 
beyond strict surveillance. 

A little while later a footman announces that 
luncheon is on the table, and the grape gatherers are 
only too happy to move, with a flutter of fans, across 
the sunny lawn to the shady loggia on the west, for 
lunch is to be al-fresco. 

The great salone, with its peeling frescoes and cold 
marble statues, is too sepulchral ; so my lady has 
chosen to set her tables under an arched cloister, 
where a frescoed roof keeps off the midday heat, and 
the carved pillars, wreathed with greenery, admit a soft 
breeze from the cool shrubbery. The meal is not like 
an English luncheon ; there is no display of fruit and 
flowers, creams and jellies, to feast the eyes during the 
earlier courses, but in their stead are old Majolica 
•dishes and ancient salt-cellars. The viands are handed 
round cut up, one dish at a time, till ten or twelve 
courses have been served. They begin with ante- 
J)asta, which in this case consists of salame (Bologna 
sausage) and fresh figs, a favourite mixture amongst 



176 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

Italians. Then comes the soup, next the bouilli. 
After that a fry, made of various animal and vegetable 
substances, including melon flowers. Next appears 
the roast, which, in honour of the English, is called 
" rosbiffe," and consists of beef stewed in wine to make 
it more luscious. Then the ztmido, or stew, a tongue 
dressed agro dolce (acid sweet), i.e., in a sauce consisting 
of chocolate, currants, pine nuts, lemon, or vinegar, 
&c., &c., and, believe it who will, a very tasty dish. 
Then follow the vegetable course, the sweets, the fruit, 
and lastly the black coffee. At a vintage dinner, how- 
ever, there is a ceremony which is not to be omitted — 
the guests must taste every kind of wine made on the 
podere. 

There is vino rosso, made from the ordinary red 
grapes ; vino stretto, the first fermentation drawn off 
before the "must" is put in; and vino bianco, from 
grapes without fermenting the skins — these have 
different names according to the podere on which they 
are grown. Then there are vin santo, a white muscatel 
wine made from white grapes partly sun-dried ; and 
Aleatico, a rich red wine, like new and heavy port, made 
from black grapes of a peculiar flavour. 

This year the peculiar feature is a new beverage 



THE VINTAGE. 177 



called Isabella wine, an inspiration of Count Benvenuti 
to turn to account the Uva Isabella, or strawberry 
grapes, an American variety lately introduced. 

As each wine has to be tasted and commented upon 
with compliments to the makers, it may be imagined 
that the meal takes some time, — so long, that the sun 
has sunk low enough to admit of walking in the more 
open parts of the ground, when the guests rise from 
table. Some of us lounge about on the terrace, 
others set off in parties down the slope to where the 
contadini are at work. The scene here is an idyll 
from Theocritus, or a lyric from Horace. A black-eyed 
maiden, with white sleeves and red kerchief, stands hold- 
ing forth her blue apron to catch the bunches which a 
youth mounted on a ladder throws down to her. Bare- 
footed girls poise their luscious loads on their heads, and 
tread majestically across the rugged soil to the tino or 
wooden receptacle, round which a group of brown- 
legged children are gathered, laughing merrily as a 
daring little comrade tinges his chubby hands in the 
red juice, and while the united strength of two fat 
babies wields the wooden crusher. 

Three merry girls, clearing a low espalier of its 
grapes, sing stornelli, and a young man with a classic 

12 



178 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

profile responds, from the heights of a mulberry-tree, 
with a rispetto. 

Curious to learn what becomes of the grapes after- 
wards, some of us follow the ox-cart on its next 
journey to the aja, where we see the contents of 
the tino bailed out into a large vat placed over a 
stand, and two men get in to crush the fruit. This 
process is repeated for fifteen days ; then the vat 
is left for two days without motion, after which the 
first wine is drawn off. This is done by taking out 
the tap near the bottom of the vat, and putting in 
its place a bunch of heather or broom as a strainer. 

This is the ordinary primitive process as still prac- 
tised in the country here by all the old-fashioned 
contadini. I have no doubt Noah was as far advanced 
in wine making as this. When all the wine is drawn 
off, the " must," i.e., stems and skins, &c., is put into a 
strettoio, or press, and the juice thus obtained is called 
vino stretto, and forms the second quality. 

After the wine is poured into barrels, it has to be 
'' governatoT Some grapes are saved, of the kinds 
called colombano, canaj'olo, or even muscatel ; they are 
boiled and thrown into the barrels. After a certain 
time the wine is again strained off, put into fresh 



THE VINTAGE. 179 



barrels, and kept for use. Some landowners have of 
late years improved on this primitive method, and 
make their wine in the more scientific French manner, 
but the improvement is by no means general. To 
make the vin santo^ or muscatel wine, the white mos- 
cato grapes are half dried in the sun and afterwards 
fermented. 

Towards sundown, shouts from below announce the 
arrival of the last ox- waggon ; a crowd of workers 
follow it, some swinging empty baskets, some shoulder- 
ing empty bigonce, others bearing loads of choice bunches 
for the Contessa to make presents to her friends. Then 
the peasant women spread tables on tressles on the 
aja, and all the workers sit down to a lively meal, the 
Countess and her guests watching them from above. 
The quick circulation of straw-covered flasks of wine 
is so constant, that it gives a sense of motion to the 
scene. 

No sooner is the pleasant supper over, than the 
strains of an accordion are heard, and the girls in great 
haste clear away the impromptu tables, roll the empty 
barrels under the arches, and sweep the yellow maize- 
pods into a heap in the corner, and the aja is forthwith 
transformed into a dancing-floor. Down troop the 



i8o TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

guests from above, and the young Contessine give 
their hands into the clasp of red-handed contadini, the 
Florentine exquisites choose the prettiest country 
lasses they can find, and the dance begins. The 
guests soon leave off, however, and stroll in couples 
about the grounds till the moon rises and reminds 
them that the day is over. 

The Countess and her daughters stand on the 
terrace echoing the last " Such a delightful day ! Good 
bye," and watch the last carriage roll down the winding 
road to follow the others, whose lamps look like a pro- 
cession of glowworms in the far-off plain. The Con- 
tessina Amalia smiles and sighs to herself as she 
watches a shadowy horse and his rider melt into space, 
till it become a mere rhythmic echo. She has gathered' 
a different vintage. Love and hope have been garnered: 
in her heart this day. 



CHAPTER II. 



Zbc Jfestipal of the 2)eab^ 

Florence, All Souls' Day, Nov. 2nd. 

ROM five o'clock in the morning the 
bells of the many churches of Florence 
have been ringing, as numberless masses 
for the dead are said to-day, it being the 
Festa di Tutti Morti. 

The religious duties within the city being performed, 
the city turns out eii masse, to make its yearly pil- 
grimage to the cemetery at San Miniato. Struck with 
the peculiarly jovial aspect of the crowd, and the 
contrast of their festal dresses to the melancholy 
errand on which they were supposed to be bent — to 




iS2 rrSCAN SA'ETCHES. 

mourn and pray over the tombs of departed relatives — 
we too prepare to do as Florence does, and start forth- 
with to see how the dead are remembered by the 
living, in the " city of flowers." 

The bridges over the Arno are crowded by a 
continuous stream of people all turned towards the 
cypress-crowned hill on the Oltr'-Arno side, where the 
grand old basilica of San INIiniato rises white and 
majestic on the summit. A motley crowd streams 
over the bridges and through the quaint streets. 
There are dark-faced Italian employes, evidently 
enjoying an unwonted holiday ; groups of bright- 
eyed Florentine maidens, in ultra-fashionable dress, 
and the inevitable ''duenna" behind them; little 
knots of black-robed priests with shovel hats, who 
walk with folded hands and severe eyes ; blue-coated 
soldiers, or bersaglieri, with flying cocks' feathers. 
Then comes a family party from the country, a brown- 
faced peasant with his little boy on his shoulder, and 
wife at his side, gay in red or yellow kerchief, and 
carrying in her arms a stiff little bundle, the moving 
head and arms of which, protruding from the top, 
proclaim it a baby. Behind them a cluster of contadini 
girls in the brightest of dresses, and with all their 



THE FESTIVAL OF THE DEAD. 



festal jewellery displayed — some wearing seven or 
eight rows of pearls round their necks, and earrings of 
enormous size. These jewels form their dote or 
marriage portion, and descend from mother to daughter 
through many generations. 

Mingling with this motley company are a few black 
figures, widows and mothers of the dead, carrying 
wreaths or crosses of immortelles, or long candles to 
burn on their tombs. These few dark spots on the 
mass of motion and colour give the key-note to the day. 
To them the day of the dead is a sacred feast, hallowed 
by love and grief, a day passed in memories of the 
happy time when those whom they go to mourn were 
walking in life and health by their side. But we 
cannot grieve for ever, and the new mourners are but 
few among the many on this bright November day. 
Some children are dancing merrily along with rings of 
everlastings in their hands inscribed " To my Brother," 
or " Sister mine," and they evidently think themselves 
favoured beyond their little friends who have no 
wreaths. One child just in front of us says to another, 
"Who is your garland for." 

" For mv aunt." 

"Ah!" replies the first, "mine is more than that, it 



THE FESTIVAL OF THE DEAD. 185 

is for my own mamma." And she displays in evident 
pride a hard yellow garland, with " Madre mia " 
written on it in black immortelles. 

Here and there rolls by the carriage of a Contessa 
or Marchesa carrying her to the Requiem Mass ; and 
walking slowly are some bare-footed Franciscan friars, 
and one or two members of different sisterhoods in 
white wimples, with rosaries in their clasped hands. 

On winds the gathering stream through the narrow 
streets, out under the dark arches of the Porta San 
Miniato and up the steep hill, called the Via Crucis, 
which leads to the great cemetery. It is bordered at 
intervals with shrines of the seven stations, at each 
■of which devout Catholics say a prayer. 

This morning every shrine is crowded by beggars, 
who collect from all parts for this day. There are 
blind beggars, lame, dumb, deaf, and dwarf beggars ; 
beggars without legs who have a peculiarly swift and 
original mode of locomotion ; beggars begging for 
themselves, and some begging for other beggars. 

On the summit of the Via Crucis are two churches. 
The smaller, the church of the Franciscan Friars, with 
their convent adjoining, on whose door-step may 
generally be seen a group of poor people bringing 



1 86 TUSCAX SKETCHES. 



their empty platters to get them filled for a meal by 
the monks. Higher up stands the great basilica of 
San IMiniato. with its inlaid marble front and glittering- 
mosaic with gold ground, which is improved from an 
ancient Lombard building erected b\- the Emperor 
Henry II. and his wife, Cunegonda. in 1013. To reach 
this we enter a dark gateway, roofed over and adorned 
with several large iron extinguishers. This is the 
ancient Ivch-Q^ate where the bearers rested the bier, 
and the extinguishers were, and are even now, used to 
put out the torches of the funeral processions. 

We pass out into the precincts of the cemetery and 
enter the orreat church bv the Porta Santa, so called be- 
cause the body of the martyr S. Miniato was discovered 
herein, and the dedication of Cunegonda's church was 
changed and took his name instead of St. Peter's. 
One's first impression was of a surging crowd swaying 
about in dangerous proximity to lighted candles, for 
the floor is strewn with tombstones, and on all these 
are wreaths and burning tapers. The crowd takes 
care of itself, and as nobody dreams of pushing, one's 
fears of conflagration wear oft' in time and we dare to 
cast our eyes around. The church is magnificent in 
form and design. Two rows of marble columns 



THE FESTIVAL OF THE DEAD. 187 

support the nave and aisles ; at the east end two flights 
of marble steps lead to the upper tribune, and a wide 
stairway descends to the crypt beneath, which has 
remains of the ancient Lombard architecture. On the 
tribune is a wonderful "ambone " in carved marble, with 
the exquisite colours of " purple antique," the most rare 
of ancient marbles. The dome of the tribune is covered 
with a fine gold-grounded mosaic of Christ with St. 
John, St. Matthew, and San Miniato, dating from the 
eleventh century ; and beneath this five windows of thin 
slabs of Oriental alabaster, through which the light of the 
morning sun passes with a soft opaque radiance. The 
choir in the tribune is filled with priests and choristers 
in their carved oak stalls, and they respond in deep 
harmonies to the priests in gorgeous robes performing 
the mass for the dead at the high altar. There is 
a very busy little acolyte who seems to think himself, 
the chief performer, and on the step of the very altar 
kneels a poor woman, who continually crosses herself^ 
and when the priest moves near her she takes the hem 
of his garment and softly kisses it. We are touched 
at the sight with the memory of another woman in the 
days when Christ was on the earth, and wonder has 
this poor creature come here for healing by faith too. 



1 88 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

In the crypt or under church are many relics ; the 
tombs of S. Miniato and other martyrs are there, and 
a niche in the wall contains the blood of some martyrs. 
In the left aisle there is a certain chapel which con- 
tains a changing crowd the whole day. Here is the 
tomb of Cardinal Jacopo di Portugallo, and his epis- 
copal chair. The tomb is the work of Rossellino, and 
very exquisite sculpture it is ; the chapel is decorated 
with lovely blue and white medallions by Luca della 
Robbia. But the q-eneral crowd does not o;ive its 
attention to these masterpieces — it is entirely directed 
to the chair of inlaid marble, which every one who 
comes in kneels and kisses ; some seat themselves 
solemnly in it for a moment, with hands in the attitude 
of prayer. We ask a man why this should be. He 
rubbed his head and shrugged his shoulders, but did 
not exactly know, only 'twas a holy relic. A woman 
was better informed, and she told us that a prayer 
or a kiss offered there gave the penitent so many 
days' indulgence, i.e., so many days off the time 
allotted to purgatory after death. The mass is over, 
the organ has ceased rolling its waves of sound through 
the arches, the crowd in the nave gently parts asunder, 
and the whole mass of priests, acolytes, choristers, &c., 



igo TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

bearing lighted candles, passes in procession down the 
steps, through the nave, and out at the Porta Santa 
to walk through the cemetery. Their chanting voices 
ring out on the clear air from the cypress-crowned hill, 
and mingle with the worldly sounds and the tolling of 
bells which come up from the city, whose towers and 
domes are gleaming down below across the glittering 
Arno. It is so old-world and artistic, that one might 
make a poem of it were it not so marred by the little- 
ness of humanity mingling with all. The bare-headed 
priests chant and pray for peace to the souls of the 
dead, who lie so silent beneath the sod on all sides of 
them ; and the atoms of living humanity called boys go 
side by side with the solemn procession, fighting each 
other over the wax which drops from the candles as 
they pass by. One little bully frightens away a girl 
whose hand is held beneath a guttering taper, and 
then takes the very piece of falling wax for himself. 
Chief amongst them is the energetic little acolyte, 
who with a solemn face possesses himself of wax right 
and left, hides it all in the breast of his full white 
ephod, and folds his hands devoutly over. 

The whole wide cemetery is full of people. On the 
inscribed slabs which form a pavement on each side 



THE FESTIVAL OF THE DEAD. 191 

of the path are mourners kneeling and praying amid 
the lighted candles flickering in the wind, and the 
efforts to keep these alight, alternate spasmodically 
with the fervency of their prayers. Every grave is 
decorated according to the taste of the mourners, some 
with real flowers, exquisite but fleeting ; the greater 
number choose a more lasting, if inartistic, form of ex- 
pression, and hang up frightful bead frames or hard 
rings of yellow and black everlastings ; some put a 
ghastly framed photograph ; and a favourite adorn- 
ment is a iron imitation flower, painted, in an iron pot. 
Tinted wreaths of flowers in tin are also frequent. 
Great variety exists also in the monuments, among 
which there is a good deal of sculptural art. 

There is a terrace raised up over the colombaria, or 
graves in wall cells, and from here a marvellous view 
of the whole cemetery, with its surging crowd of 
priests and processions ; vendors of cakes, sweets, and 
cigars ; girls with mass books and rosaries in one hand, 
fruit in the other ; weeping mourners, and jesting 
young men ; bereaved mothers and wives bewailing 
for those who are hidden from them by the cruel 
marble slab ; and light-hearted girls with all their 
thoughts warm for the hopes of the future love. Life 



19- 



TL'SCAy SA'ErCIIES. 



and death, and death and life, contrasted side by side in 
a hundred different guises. 

And down below the hill of the dead, beautiful 
Florence, with the bridge-spanned Arno flowing 
amidst its towers and palaces. And that, too, speaks of 
death and life — a nation has died, and a new nation is 
growing to strength and power. And farther off are the 
mountains, veiled in golden mist, which seem to speak 
of the everlasting. 





CHAPTER III. 

Ht the Batbs. 

HE Italians like to take their pleasures as 
they do their penances, in a concentrated 
form. They bring a mass of social gaieties 
to a strong focus, surfeit themselves 
with balls, concerts, "Fieri," and " Corsi " for a few 
weeks, and call it " carnival." They crowd all the 
penances and fastings and sermons into the Lenten 
season, and then take no more thought till next year. 

On the same principle, ladies receive all their calls 
on one day of the week, and live in homely solitude in 
Xh^iY peignoirs for the next six days. 

Sea-bathing subjected to a like process becomes 
compressed into the short space of two months, when 

13 




fo .■• . .V, K '^1 


ir' 




11 


h-y .■:'''^:H, -'-i'lll!:, ,„, ,,1)111 


Ib 


jj^ 


It-f! 



AT THE BATHS. 195 



as many ephemeral dissipations as possible are crowded 
toorether on the seashore. Not an Italian who can 
afford his yearly sojourn at the baths, even if it be only 
a fortnight, will miss it ; but not one would dream of 
taking it in June or September, when he might obtain 
greater benefit at half the expense. No ! To the 
Tuscan mind Neptune's temple is only open for a 
limited time, and everybody must crowd to worship 
him simultaneously — i.e., in July and August. 

To our English ideas this seems inconceivable. 
During those two months the scorching rays of " Sol 
Leone " render the sands a burning desert, the sea is as 
warm as the hot air above it, and the close lodgings 
too stifling to endure. Of what use is a month at the 
seaside to us if our children cannot dig in the sands, 
and our boys and girls take long walks, seaweed and 
sea anemone hunting ? 

Italian dolce-far-niente requires none of these things ; 
given an awning over his head, a boarded platform 
under his feet, one, two, or three chairs to sit or lie 
upon, a caff^ and billiard-room close at hand, and time 
to enjoy it all, a Tuscan is supremely happy. 

One advantage of the tideless sea is, that one is 
enabled to have fixed edifices for bathing. At Leg- 



196 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

horn, where the shore is rocky, the baths are formed 
of terraces running out into the sea, in the way which 
PHny describes them to have been at Baia. These 
terraces are covered with large awnings, and people 
sit and work, or read the whole day with the water 
lapping round their little artificial island. Some of the 
terraces are lined on both sides with tiny dressing 
chambers, each with its own awning stretching out like 
a hood into the sea, so that if preferred the bath can 
be taken in entire privacy. This advantage be it said, 
is only appreciated by the elderly, or those /^i'5'/ devo- 
tees of fashion whose beauty depends on the arts of 
the toilette. The young and active prefer to disport 
themseves in the little artificial bays, or even to swim 
out into the open sea. 

At Viareggio, another favourite Tuscan bathing 
place, where the shore is wide and sandy, the baths 
are all built on piles. In the winter the shores look 
like a submerged forest of dead pines ; in the summer 
there are ball-rooms, caffes, terraces, shops, and dress- 
ing rooms, all raised airily above the waves of the 
blue Mediterranean. Being so high above the water, 
there are no enclosures to each bath as at Leghorn, 
but every room is supplied with a trap-door and 



TUSCAN SKETCHES. 



wooden steps, and privacy is only to be obtained by ■ 
remaining in the dark waters amidst the piles. Between 
the baths and the Marina (a long row of new houses, 
small and exorbitantly dear during the season) is a 
Sahara, a sandy waste that has the power of absorbing 
the heat to a wonderful extent. 

Viareggio is a kind of debatable ground between 
Neptune and Tellus. The sea recedes yearly, and as 
it draws back, the houses and gardens advance. The 
ex-Marina becomes Via Ugo Foscolo, and a new 
Marina thrusts its lines of little balconied, persiani 
decked houses halfway between it and the sea. One 
year the sands are wide, the next season they are 
transformed into gardens of aloes, tamarisks, oleanders, 
and other silicious vegetation. Rising behind the 
town are the giant forms of the Carrara mountains, 
which, though steadfast and immutable as to form, 
clothe themselves in ever changing mists and shadows, 
giving an endless variety to the monotonous plains of 
marshy land and pine forests spread at their feet. 

Now, having glanced at our surroundings, let us 
take our work-baskets and sit at the Baths, while 
we study our neighbours. Here is a little vacant 
space ; we seek empty chairs to fill it, but as all the 



A T THE BA THS. 



earliest comers take two — one as a chair and the other 
as a table and footstool — we have a long search 
amongst the crowd before we are seated. This is the 
assembly balcony, and reaches quite out into the sea. 
Linen awnings, bound with scarlet, wave in the breeze 
around us, and the whole space is filled with family 
and friendly groups, little knots of chairs drawn 
together in circles. The ladies are employed in dainty 
fancy work, or occupied in active use of that excuse for 
idleness — the fan. Elderly gentlemen read their news- 
papers or talk politics, while the young ones lean over 
the balustrade to watch the bathers, or manoeuvre to 
get an introduction to the belle of the season. 

The " Bagni da Mare " must be a good time for 
the modistes, for dress and fashion appear to be 
the objects of existence here. Quiet ladies who at 
home are unobtrusively dressed, come out at the 
seaside in three or even four complete costumes a 
day. Monsieur Worth would be alternately filled with 
envy and paralyzed with horror to be suddenly set 
down amidst the wondrous toilettes that congregate 
here. Look at that stout dark woman with an oilskin 
sailor hat which would suit her youngest boy. She 
has a talent for originality, for over her dress of blue 



TUSCAN SKETCHES. 



linen she has made a tunic of a long fishing-net, with 
a twine fringe wound in such mysterious coils, and 
passes around her portly person, that she seems a fish- 
woman entangled in her own net. Her daughters are 
also supplied with sailor hats, sailor collars, pea jackets, 
with large brass buttons ; and her boys are miniature 
" man-of-war's " men. Next to this naval group of 
women are three or four sisters, neither young nor 
pretty. They have done their best with limited 
means to appear at the Baths in due splendour, by 
donning their old ball dresses of the past carnival. 

Near them is an elegant Russian princess, lounging 
in her Lucca chair, surrounded by a group of satellites. 
Her toilette is the most exquisite compound of lawn 
lace and embroidery, fresh, yet soft and filmy ; a 
gipsy hat, with a lace handkerchief tied round it, 
is the only ornament of her head. Dos a dos to 
this piece of elegant simplicity is a mass of blue 
flounces, bouillons, pouffs, bows, knots, rosettes, but- 
tons, lace, fringe, — in fact, enough raw material to make 
three costumes all crowded into one. Of course the 
hair which belongs to this marvel of complex needle- 
work is powdered, (gold dust does not suit Italian com- 
plexions) and frizzed, and curled, and plaited. This 



A T THE BA THS. 



remarkable person does not affect fancy work ; but she 
plays with her parasol and fan, and smells a bit of gera- 
nium, till a young man, of a dandy appearance, with 
an exaggerated style of dress, begs it of her with many 
compliments ; and another, with tight boots and blue 
necktie, brings her a rose in its place. 

Here is a proud mother with three pretty daughters, 
all so fresh with their white pique dresses and black 
velvet bows, and two or three lively young fellows pre- 
tending great interest in the mysteries of tatting and 
lace working. One even tries to learn frivolitd, and 
gets his awkward hands curiously entangled with those 
of his pretty teacher, as he makes Gordian knots 
instead of sliding ones. 

The season at the Baths is the young girl's delight. 
She is kept so closely under surveillance in ordinary 
life, that until her parents find her a " sposo " she lives 
the life of a recluse. But for these happy weeks she 
•enjoys all the sweets of flirtation and admiration, and 
very often saves papa the trouble of finding an " occa- 
■siojie " for her, by falling in love before marriage like 
an English girl. 

What with the mornings at the Bath, the evenings 
on the Molo, or on the public promenade, and the 



202 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

balls in the assembly rooms every night, this charmed 
fortnight or month glides by only too fast, and when 
all the pretty toilettes are worn she goes home very 
reluctantly. 

Here comes a soi-disant artist. He has devised a 
costume which will announce the fact to the world at 
large, and appears in a pleated grey blouse with a loose 
waistband, a Tyrolese hat worn jauntily and adorned 
by an eagle's feather, emblematic of his high aspira- 
tions, a sketch-book lives habitually under his left arm, 
and his huge walking-stick has a knack of developing 
unexpectedly into a camp-stool when he finds a subject 
worthy of his sarcastic pencil. This " fop of the 
brush " is a caricaturist, and people say he is making 
his fortune at the Baths this year. Here is his method. 
A clever sketch or caricature of some well-known 
habitiid is hung up in a conspicuous place and ticketed 
"25 francs." If the subject be flattered, he or she, or 
her admirers, gladly purchase ; if, on the contrary, the 
unfortunate object be rendered ridiculous, she, or her 
nearest relatives, hasten to buy, as the only means to 
escape unenviable notoriety. 

He is a wise man and sure to make money who 
trades on the weakness of others. 



A T THE BA THS. 205 



Another favourite amusement at the Baths are lot- 
teries, or what we call raffles. Here is a man with a 
large basket of fruit, peaches, figs, pears, and grapes. 
Going in and out among the crowd with a printed 
lottery paper of ninety numbers, he soon gets them 
filled up at 2>^ centesimi each (3d.). Near us is a 
group of ladies and some gentlemen, one of whom has 
just been introduced as Signor Conti. 

He declines to take a number, saying he never 
wins anything, but one of the young ladies proposes 
that he should put his name and she will choose the 
number. Of course he complies, politeness forbids, 
him to do otherwise. 

An hour passes, when the man reappears with the 
fruit, saying, " Signor Conti has won ; can you tell me 
where he is ? " 

"He is gone away, but there is his wife," replies 
one of the bystanders. 

The lady indicated sits in the centre of a large 
group of friends, with her children around her. 

" The Signor, husband of your excellency, has won 
this," announces the man, setting down the basket on 
a vacant chair in the midst. 

Signora Conti reading her husband's name on the 



204 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

card unsuspectingly accepts the gift, gives the man a 
small "buona mano" (fee), and, with effusion, presses 
all her friends to partake. 

The children are all liberally helped, and content 
shines on their little faces, when up rushes the father, 
-snatches the very grapes from their hands, exclaiming 
hastily — 

" Giulia cara ! there is a mistake, this is not ours ! " 

Here is a catastrophe ! 

Madame Giulia stays her liberal hand with a look 
of horror, glances at her friends, of whom one is 
transfixed with the last mouthful of a pear in her 
mouth. Another instinctively holds out her hand to 
restore, but, alas ! only a bare peach stone is there. 
Two more look disconsolately at the naked ramifica- 
tions which were erst bunches of grapes. 

Husband wrings his hands, looks appealingly round. 

" But, Enrico ! " demands his wife, "if it is not yours, 
why is your name on it ? " 

" Because I won it, to be sure." 

" Oh, then, it is all right ! Why did you alarmi us 
so ? Pray continue. Take some more," she adds, 
offering the unlucky fruit to her friends. 

" No, it is not all right. I won it for a lady ! " 



A T THE BA THS. 205- 



Now ensues a storm in a teacup. Wife does not 
even know the lady, and becomes an avenging goddess 
on her side. Husband escapes the storm by carrying 
off the fruit on his part. Wife sits down rigid and 
white among her friends. Signor Conti returns with 
the basket, — 

" Take it ! " he exclaims ; " Miss S. refuses it." 

" Carry it back," ejaculates Madame in majestic 
scorn. " I refuse to take what your Miss S., whoever 
she is, leaves." 

Unfortunate husband makes two or three frantic 
journeys, till a sensible mutual friend introduces Miss 
S. to Madame ; explanations ensue, and the whole- 
reinforced party eat the grapes in peace. 

So much for the amusements of the elders ; the 
children do not find it a time of unmitigated pleasure, 
or rather wotdd not, were they English children. The 
sands are there to dig in, but the sun is on them like a 
fire all day; and, besides, Italian "lusso" (stylishness) 
does not admit of the toilette being disarranged by 
play. 

The little belles — in all the glory of spotless muslin,, 
lace and embroidery, earrings and necklace, and costly 
ribbons, low frocks and patent-leather shoes, or white 



2o6 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

kid boots, fan in hand, and a ludicrous expression of 
self-content — are set on a chair with the ribbons and 
lace well spread out, and here they sit listening to all 
the nonsense talked by their elders, or, if they are 
near other children, compare and criticise each other's 
finery. In the evening they are re-dressed in finer 
lace and embroidery, often with silk stockings and 
white gloves, and taken to the Baths, where a children's 
ball precedes the dance with which their elder brothers 
and sisters invariably end the evening. 

Poor little children ! at eight and nine years be- 
ginning the frivolities of society, instead of the healthy 
^ames of childhood. No wonder they look like little 
men and women — sallow and melancholy. 

The boys are slightly better off than the girls, for 
they do a little mild fishing over the balustrades of 
the baguette, but they are under the same dread of 
soiling their clothes as their sisters, for have not their 
mothers and aunts spent much time in covering their 
^'tussore" knickerbockers with red and blue braiding, 
or their velvet suits with braid lace till they look like 
dressmakers' models ? 

Now and then a family party pack up their work 
and move off to the side corridors, on each side of 



A T THE BA THS. 207 



which are the dressing-rooms. This is always a busy- 
scene. Here are eager girls urgently demanding a 
room, and waylaying the bath-women as they go by 
buried under a pile of sheets and bathing costumes. 
Here are portly ladies standing at the doors of 
dressing-rooms, vainly calling for the man to come and 
mop the floor ; here are the children restless with 
anxiety to get a good splash in the shallow water, 
where they will feel a few degrees cooler and have no 
frocks to spoil. At last they are suited with rooms ; 
the green doors shut, and, instead of the stylish figures 
that have disappeared above, certain shivering, bare- 
footed nymphs descend the damp steps from the 
flooring of one room, and two or three brown-skinned 
young savages plunge off the steps of the next, 
and the family are re-united. The Signora and Sig- 
nore are content to cling to each other, or to the ropes, 
and dip placidly in the warm water ; but the youths 
and maidens dive and swim, and " fanno la morta " 
(make a corpse), as they call floating, to their hearts' 
^ content. And what swimmers they are, these little 
dark-eyed girls ! With their hair fully dressed, and a 
rough straw hat on (sometimes the more careful hide 
their tresses under an oilskin cap with a scarlet ruche 



aoS TC'SCAA' STCDIES, 



round it), with their gold bracelets gleamini^- on their 
arms, wnth a becoming sailor blouse and drawers, 
bright with white braid and buttons, they are much 
more natural in the \\"ater than on land. Look at 
that handsome girl ; she swims like a sea nymph. 
Not at all in the English fashion, which reduces all 
swimmers to a unifomi likeness to a frog, but she just 
reclines on her side in the water, and, waving her 
arms like \'ivien weaving magic spells, keeps pace 
with her vigorous brother. This side swimming is a 
new method, and combines great speed with decided 
elegance. 

There is one Q-allerv" devoted lo smaller dressing- 
rooms, without pink cambric and muslin toilettes, and 
having only one open staircase from the balcony^ 
which runs in front of all the rooms. This gallery is 
devoted to single gentlemen. At the further end. in 
a spot visible from the promenade balcony, is a long 
projecting plank, about five feet above the sea. 
Here young Italy indulges its acrobatic tendencies. 
Muscular young figures, in eccentric ** tights." run along- 
the plank, form classic silhouettes against the blue sky 
for a moment as they get up an impetus by swaying, 
then splash a somersault into the waves. Here goes 



A T THE BA THS. 209 



an ancient Briton in blue jersey, with the sun and 
moon on his back ! There leaps backwards an old 
Egyptian, all stripes ! A yellow Indian makes a ball 
of himself, and turns twice as he falls. Then one 
pretends to be dead, and lets his friends roll him along 
the plank till they kick him into the water. Now 
come three at once, and form a pyramid one on the 
other's shoulders, and all commit mock suicide to- 
gether. 

After this energetic diversion the youths will 
emerge, wrap themselves in their sheets, and, lighting 
their cigars, will enjoy themselves in an Arab guise, 
leaning over their own balustrade. 

The favourite masculine amusement is the "skate 
canoe." Two parallel bars of wood are united by 
one or two raised seats ; on this doubtful bark a 
party of young men will paddle out half a mile, now 
tumbling off, now swimming behind, now mounted on 
the top, till they look like uncivilized beings in the 
days of the flood. Here comes a boat with a party 
of bathers, returning, wrapped in their drying sheets, 
and they look like the mysterious souls in Charon's 
ferry-boat. 

Half an hour later you might see both the ante- 

14 



TUSCAN SKETCHES. 



diluvian savages and the ghostly souls decorously- 
dressed in broadcloth and playing a game of billiards. 

At about two o'clock the Baths become completely 
empty, and do not fill again till evening, when the 
crowd comes back in renewed splendour, to dance, to 
flirt on moonlit balconies, and eat ices as they listen 
to the band, or to show off their musical accomplish- 
ment by performing on the piano in the assembly 
rooms. 

From eight to nine the children are allowed to 
dance, which they do with all the aplomb of their 
elder sisters. Now and then crops up a bit of nature 
that is quite refreshing amid the artificiality. Here 
is a little maiden who looks like an illustration in 
a French fashion-book ; she has spread out her sash 
and her embroideries with so much care that they 
extend to the next chair. Enter a fresh little English 
girl and takes the vacant seat on the spread fineries. 
Little Italia, with a " Scusi, Signorina, you might 
have a little regard for my poor sash ! " draws it away 
and smooths it tenderly. 

"If you want to take care of it, you should keep it 
on your own chair," retorts the matter-of-fact little 
" Inglese." 



A T THE BA THS. 



Presently a mutual friend, In the shape of a dark- 
eyed boy in velvet knickerbockers, takes the English 
child to the dance. Italia frowns and pouts in solitude, 
yellow ribbons can no more console her, convention 
fades from her narrow little soul, nature takes posses- 
sion of it, and she jumps up, rushes into the circle of 
waltzers, pulls the astonished Inglese from the arms of 
her partner with a fierce " Now it is my turn ; Gianni 
must dance with me." 

Close by, a stylish mamma is trying to induce an 
overgrown boy to dance with her tiny sprite of a girl. 
He looks down on her with supreme disdain, saying, 
"" Che ! what shall I do with her, shall I put her in my 
pocket ? " 

Tiny sprite half begins to cry, but shrugging her 
shoulders turns away with a " Che vuole ! he is only a 
schoolboy though he is so big ; here is Luigi, I shall 
dance with him,'' while the tall boy, with his hands in 
his pockets, coolly walks off to find a girl of his own 
size. 

At nine o'clock the little people begin to find them- 
selves danced down by their elders, and by degrees 
give up the ground. The lamps are brilliantly 
lighted ; the piano, which kind aunts and elder 



212 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

sisters have been playing, gives place to a string 
band. 

Chaperons and escorts make a goodly array of wall- 
flowers on the red divans which surround the assembly 
rooms, and the ball begins in right earnest. Young 
men who have friends here find partners at once, but 
those who know nobody have to hunt up some chance 
acquaintance to introduce them. One of the prettiest 
girls has taken a fancy to sit among the elders this 
evening, and has refused half a dozen partners in 
succession. 

" Why, SIgnorina Veronica, you always dance so 
much," says a lady acquaintance ; " why do you refuse 
this evening ? " 

" Because I am affianced," replies Miss Veronica, 
without the slightest confusion. 

" Indeed ! I congratulate you. Since when } is it 
a ' buon occasione ? ' " (good match) asks the friend 
eagerly. 

" It was settled last night. My sposo is Signor 
Tigretti of Leghorn. He heard of me from a friend 
of papa's and thought I should suit him, so he came to 
see me on Tuesday. Papa liked him and the matter 
was settled at once, as he found my dote sufficient^ 



AT THE BATHS. 213 



We were engaged last night and he went away this 
morning ; but he returns on Sunday, then I will intro- 
duce him to you." ^ 

All this is said in a matter-of-fact tone — the girl 
seems quite proud of her new dignity ; but our Eng- 
lish mind is lost in astonishment at her courage in 
risking her whole future in the hands of a man she 
had only seen for one day, and the cheerfulness with 
which she immediately gives up the girlish pleasures 
she has so thoroughly enjoyed for the sake of this 
stranger. 

The lady who made the inquiry, espying through 
the maze of dancers her daughter accepting an in- 
eligible partner, hurries off with " I must go and look 
after Elvira," and with a patent excuse takes her from 
the very arms of her partner. Elvira pouts, but must 
obey ; mamma, however, consoles her with proposing 
to go to the balcony and have an ice. A combination 
of pine-apple ice, a moonlit sea, a.nd a forthcoming 
partner in uniform, soon combine their irresistible 
charms in smoothing Elvira's frowns. Meanwhile it 
is highly probable that papa in the billiard-room is 
listening amicably to matrimonial overtures for her 

^ A fact. 



2 1 4 TUSCAN SKE TCHES. 

from a stout middle-aoed man who has made a fortune 
in castor oil and orris root, and Elvira's dancing days 
at the Baths are doomed. 

So the evening passes, and by eleven the crowds 
have dispersed to their various abodes, the lights are 
out, and quiet reigns at the Baths ; where the waters 
lap gently round the piles, and the moonlight makes 
weird black shadows, till with daylight the airy struc- 
ture is filled with life again, and the bathing, flirting, 
envy, delight, scandal, flattery, dancing, and display 
begin afresh. 

But we must not leave ViareQ-crio without a o-lance 
at the Capanne or huts. The legitimate Baths only 
occupy half the length of the sands facing the town. 
Some original mind wishing to escape the " fashion " 
of the Baths once built himself a hut with straw 
hurdles, where he could enjoy the sea. and escape the 
sun in peace. 

Now, half a mile of the shore is lined with these 
wigwams, and they are quite as much frequented for 
bathing purposes as the more costly and decorous 
Bagnetti. Walk down this part of the sands, and you 
feel as though you have left Belgravia to plunge into 
savage life. Here maidens, sitting on little wooden 



AT THE BATHS. 215 



Stools under a thatched tent, dry their dishevelled 
locks. There a group of young savages in simple 
costume of bathing drawers and jerseys, run in and 
out of the waves, and roll themselves in the sand in 
delightful freedom. 

A shivering girl emerges like Venus from the 
waves, and runs barefoot and dripping across the 
sands to her dressing hut, or her attendant waits her at 
the water's edge and envelopes her in the sheet like 
as with a cloud. 

Tall manly figures fold their damp limbs in their 
sheets, and stalk to their huts with the dignity of Arab 
chiefs in their duj'nozcs. Children sock and shoeless, 
paddle in the shallow water, and dig in the sands to 
their hearts' content, under the shadow of the wigwam. 
This is half a mile of earthly ground in which Mrs. 
Grundy dares not meddle ; here " what is proper " 
gives way to " what is comfortable ; " but to the 
fashionables at the Bagnetti, the Capanne are as if 
they did not exist, so completely do they ignore them. 



CHAPTER IV. 



Ube 6io6tra; ox, ©pen^Hir pla^s 
in the Hpennines* 

The Nook, August i^th. 

OR some days we have been asked by our 
mountain neighbours, " Are you going to 
the Giostra at Riobujo ? " and we are 
much puzzled what these jousts can be. 
The name is suggestive of the Middle Ages, but as 
Giostre in Italy have never been known since the 
Medici revival of them in the fifteenth century, — when 
both Lorenzo and Giuliano de Medici won laurels at a 
tournament, and their respective poets laureate, Politian 
and Luca Pulci, sang their praises, — the mystery re- 




2i8 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

mains obscure, and we must go to Riobujo to solve it. 
This village with the grandiose name " dark river," is 
a cluster of peasants' houses near the top of a pass 
over the Tuscan Apennines ; the dark river resolves 
itself into a mountain stream running deep in a wooded 
gorge near. If there are any remnants of the past 
lingering on in attenuated old age anywhere, we may be 
sure to find them up in the remote mountain regions ; 
therefore, full of curiosity to see what semblance the 
Giostre at Riobujo bear to the chivalresque jousts, we 
start in a calesse, on the day of the festa, for a long 
drive up the pass. The calesse is a vehicle on two 
wheels, with a rope net instead of a foot-board, and a 
wooden seat slung across on leather straps. The 
shafts — which are merely the cart frame continued, 
without hinges — are fastened up high to a kind of 
Spanish mule-saddle above the horse's back. The 
■capacity of a calesse for jolting may be imagined from 
this — ^it can never be described. 

As we toil slowly up the ascent, winding round 
clefts and projections in the wooded hills, and skirting 
fresh valleys, we overtake several walking parties, 
whole families of peasants in festal dress : young men 
in groups of six or seven, and young women in gay 



THE GIOSTRA. 219 



kerchiefs and coral necklaces, fluttering their fans as 
they stroll. 

Now and then a group disappears from sight, plung- 
ing under the flickering shadows of the chestnut trees 
to take a short cut, and comes out far before us at a 
higher turn in the zigzag road. We all meet together at 
length at Riobujo, where a great crowd is assembled. 
It begins to dawn on us that the "Giostra" is not a fight,, 
but a drama, for in front of a row of two or three houses 
a rough platform Is erected level with the first-floor 
windows. This primitive stage (which is very similar 
to one I have seen represented in an old engraving of 
an Anglo-Saxon play) is adorned at the two corners 
with evergreens and flags on the supporting pole, 
and draped along the whole length of the back with 
quilts ! They must have made a general collection 
of the counterpanes of the village ; there are white 
ones with fringe, brown home-woven quilts, and ancient 
green and yellow ones hung on a line as if to dry. 
More quilts are suspended from the stage to the 
ground, making a screen to the prompter who stands 
on a table below the stage, his head and shoulders 
appearing above it covered with a cowl, made of a 
clever conjunction of willow sticks with an old yellow 



220 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

shawl. The gallery of this primitive al fresco 
theatre is naturally formed by stone steps and a 
sloping ground rising to the level of the road in front 
of the houses. A clean-swept aja or threshing- 
floor has been roofed with evergreens stretched on 
poles, and forms the reserved boxes to which we are 
with great ceremony shown. We make use of our 
waiting time to gain some information respecting 
Giostre, and learn that one or the other of the neigh- 
bouring villages holds one nearly every year, giving 
three representations on three following feste. The 
actors are all natives of the place except two from 
Cutigliano. The old peasant had no idea why they 
were called Giostre, unless because there was generally 
some fighting in them. 

" Ah ! " said a young man, " if you could have seen 
ours at Piteglio last year ! We had the Emperor 
Constantine fighting for Rome with Maxentlus, when 
he saw the cross in the air. There were the Turks 
in it, all as natural as life." 

What the Turks had to do with Constantine and 
Maxentius is a matter of conjecture, but it seems 
necessary for the Italians to connect the Ttirks with 
any ancient war, their idea of history being evidently 



THE GIOSTRA. 221 



bounded at its remotest era by the Crusades. There 
might be also a special connection of Turks with the 
Giostre on account of the Giostra al Saracino spoken 
of above, and that in its turn would seem a natural 
outgrowth from the Crusades. 

We hear that Semiramide is to be represented, and 
are morally sure that the Turks will be in Nineveh. 

Attention ! the orchestra enters. Two youths em- 
bracing antique, stringed instruments pass through 
the audience, disappear beneath the quilts under the 
platform, reappear between those above, and, taking 
seats at the back of the stage, wipe their faces previous 
to performance. One has frizzy hair which compels 
his hat to stay curiously poised on the back of his 
head ; he has very prominent eyes, and an expression 
which would be melancholy if it were not vacant. 
They begin a curious jig movement with a tum-tum 
accompaniment, by way of overture ; the frizzy youth 
sawing away at his " viol-da-gamba " like a butcher 
sawing a bone. The violinist tucks a handkerchief 
under his chin, ostensibly to save a bright red necktie 
from friction, and, turning up his eyes, plays his instru- 
ment with as much energy as is compatible with the 
simultaneous consolation of a cigar. A sound 01 



322 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

drums and trumpets in the distance ! a shout of 
^' Eccoli ! " a rustle among the crowd ; all the women 
who were nursing their babies comfortably on the 
steps are disturbed, and fourteen or sixteen performers 
march through the audience gleaming in coloured 
satin and tinsel. They disappear behind the screen, 
and the audience settles down in breathless expec- 
tation. 

Of course there is a prologue, for is it not the ancient 
Roman custom ? This is carried out quite in the 
classical way, as Terence says it should be. The 
prologue expounds the plot, and is spoken by a youth 
who is not an actor. A kind of herald enters solo ; he 
is dressed in rose-coloured plush, slashed with green, 
a yellow sash and a turban of feathers, in the American 
Indian style. In one hand he holds a bouquet, and in 
the other a lady's embroidered pocket-handkerchief! 
He gives out the plot of the coming play, telling the 
audience in couplets, set to a curious pentatonic chant, 
what they shall see, each line ending with a long 
croon. It seems a tone come up from the remote 
past, and quite carries out Carl Engel's theory of the 
ancient scale being pentatonic, i.e., five notes, leaving 
out our fourth and seventh, which gives a curious 



THE GIOSTRA. 223. 



minor cadence. There are just these five minor notes, 
and no variation is made on them the whole time. 
This is the way in which the prologue is spoken. 
The herald, standing at the left end of the stage, 
croons out a couplet with an agonized expression of 
countenance ; then the violins play a few strains while 
he walks the whole length of the stage smelling his 
flowers ; he gives another distressed couplet at the 
extreme right, again retraces his steps, still smelling 
his flowers, and repeats the operation so long that it 
is a relief when the clown comes in and abuses him for 
disturbing his slumbers. 

Now the drama begins in right earnest, for Ninus 
enters, preceded by his sword-bearer and followed by 
his soldiers, who according to our prophecy are 
Turks, for they wear the crescent ! We might fancy 
the half-moons an emblem of Astarte or her Ninevite 
predecessor, were they not the adornment of turbans, 
and accompanied by Turkish jackets and trousers. 
As for Ninus, he has a red velvet cloak richly 
trimmed with silver tinsel, and a crown of towers 
(like that of " Italia " on the national paper money) 
mounted on the top of a pink tarlatan turban. 

There is a general darkness and veiny roughness 



224 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

about the hands of the performers, and a certain 
villainous expression in their features, which gaudy 
costumes have a knack of bringing out on honest 
working faces. The seams worn on a countenance 
by hard labour, take the appearance of sinister 
wrinkles when set in an incongruous costume. As 
there are no drop scenes the action is continuous ; 
one set of actors disappears and the other appears 
between the curtains the whole time. There is of 
course a rival king at war with Ninus, and the good 
arrangement is made that one comes forth always on 
the right, the other on the left, so that the audience is 
not confused as to which side they are listening. It 
certainly is a little surprising that having discovered 
Turks in the army of Ninus, we should also behold 
them in that of his rival — but there they are ! That 
glorious army is composed of two Turks and two 
nondescripts, who have the hats of jockeys, the frilled 
trousers of ddbardeuses at a Florentine "Veglione," 
and some wonderful embroidered jackets suitable to 
the Giaour or the Corsair. A great many scenes are 
taken up by the missions of ambassadors to the rival 
courts, each of which appears in its turn till war is 
declared, and the young general Almiro protests he is 



THE GIOSTRA. 225 



ready for death in the service of Ninus. In ancient 
history Almiro figures as Onnes. 

Place aux Dames! Enter Semiraniide with the 
general. Her costume is curiously modern ; she 
wears a red silk skirt and Roman stays of black 
velvet, a silver chain large enough to adorn the 
Lord Mayor, while on her head is a common black 
straw hat with a bunch of blue and yellow flowers in 
it, and a black lace fall projecting from its wide brim. 
Till now the whole drama has been solemnly chanted 
to the same five weird notes with a croon at the end 
of each line. The feminine method of declaiming is 
different ; she sings the same chant in a shriller key, 
with a shake, a quaver, or a turn ad lib. on each note ! 

We wonder whether the ancient Roman plays were 
sung to a pentatonic chant. It is known that those 
of the early Italian poets were recited in tone ; the 
Semiramide of Metastasio was intended to be suno- in 
this way. It might be a remnant of the old Saturnian 
canto which Micali (" Popoli Antichi," vol. ii. ch. xxiii.) 
describes as a species of irregular iambic, without any 
other laws except a certain sonorous rhythm adapted 
to singing. The Canto Fescennino, or Fescennian 
song, was alternate, and still survives in the mountains 

15 



226 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

in the alternate singing of the Stornelli amongst the 
contadini. Whatever its origin, it is possible that in 
this rude chanting recitation we have the prototype of 
the Italian opera. ^ 

It is soon evident that we are not listening either to 
Metastasio's mild poetical version of Semiramis, or to 
Rossini's grand but wicked plot ; nor yet exactly to the 
orthodox story given by mythologists, although it ap- 
proaches nearer to this than any. The contadims 
Semiramide is a different person altogether. She 
might be masculine, even cruel, but they maintain her 
conjugal virtue. She has a husband, and is faithful to 
him to the last ! That husband is the young general 
Almiro, whose destiny she laments, and begs to be 
allowed to share, by going with him to the war. This 
affecting scene is regulated by the same etiquette which 
marked that of the herald ; two couplets are spoken on 
the left, then the pair follow each other to the right of 
the stage, there to chant the next verse. 

Then ensue several more political intrigues. The 

' The founder of the opera was a certain Ottavio Rinnuccini, who 
wrote two musical dramas. The first, " Daphne," was performed in 
the Palazzo Corsi in 1594; the second, " Euridice," in 1600, at the 
marriage of Maria de' Medici with Henri IV. of France. Jacopo 
Peri set both these primitive operas to music. 



THE GIOSTRA. 227 



general gives orders of war to two officers ; a spy 
hears all that passes, and informs his king, who appears 
to make counter-schemes on the right. The dulness 
of these war tactics is enlivened by the clown, who 
comes and volunteers his services with a sieve in his 
hand, saying, " lo per cento vaglio solo." A comic 
pantomime of sifting grain gives point to this joke, 
the word vaglio meaning both " sift," and "to be 
worth." 

" Now we shall see the Giostra," says the audience, 
and truly in the next scene fighting begins. Two 
armies of five men in each draw up in front of each 
other, the muffled drums beat, the two generals chal- 
lenge in chanted couplets, of which we can only hear 
on one side the words, " dolce invito " (sweet invita- 
tion"), and on the other something about "hopes of 
cutting you in pieces " — which sound rather contradic- 
tory. The insulted king advances, still chanting his 
defiance in the same weird tones ; the other replies in 
perfect rhythm. It reminds one of Homer's heroes, 
who always speak good poetry when they attack their 
enemies. Thus singing they advance, cross swords 
three times, retire, and thrust at the air ; this goes on 
over and over again, the time crescendo, till Semiramide, 



22S T(/SCAiY SKETVNESs 

in a cuirass and helmet, rushes in, Hko Minerva on 
Achilles, and, pulling- away her husband from tho ranks. 
takes his place, with such otToct that the oncnn gives 
way, and the rival king humbly hands over his crown 
and sword to her : on which her husband, who had 
stood calmly in the background. con\es forward to 
upbraid her with taking his pkice — whicl\ shows a 
ver}* manly ingratitude on his part. 

In the next scene Almiro brings his ca[>ti\ os to the 
kino- Ninus, who makes the rival kiui: his iribuiarv. 
and restores him his crown and sw ord. 

Almiro recounts his own " coraggio ed arte." .uid his 
wife's good fortune : on which N inus makes .i very 
original proposal lo take Alniiro's wife tor queen, and 
give him his daughter instead. The daughter st.uuls 
by the throne, a tall girl in yellow and blue satin. .n\d 
crown of red feathers, and does not seem at all horrit'ied 
at this proposition. 

Great excitement ensues. Almiro cries. " T.ike my 
life, but not my wife ; '" the girl begins. " Padre amato." 
but is told by Ninus to be silent. Almiro proving 
obdurate, his arms are taken, and he is banished. 
Several scenes are occupied b}' embassies to Semi- 
ramide, who refuses all overtures, and goes to seek 



'///A h J' J ■■//■' A 229 



her husband. The king flings away his royal mantle 
and crown, and follows her. 

It would take too much were we to follow all the 
scenes of this prolix drama. Suffice it to say, Almiro 
dies, or seems to die, and Semiramide weeps over him 
by applying her handkerchief to the outside of the lace 
veil. After which she abuses Ninus, telling him " he is 
more cruel than Xero," a curiously prophetic saying 
from a Ninevite queen. Next she marries Ninas to 
gain from him the promise of a day's supreme power, 
wlii^h, as soon as she has adjusted the crown on the 
top of her hat, she uses by ordering the guards to put 
Ninus to death. lie AJls in \\v: midst of a torrent of 
entreaties, on boin;.^ pointed at l^y two long swords. 
'I'll': d;i,ijghter swoons, and is drawn out of sight behind 
the curtain, and the king awaits his burial alone. 

Till now the drama, though to us comic from its 
incongruities, has not been at all a burlesque. This 
scene, however, is decidedly meant to be comic, whether 
it be from the Italian inherent dislike of solemnity and 
pain I do not know, but the effort was certainly made 
to take away the horror of death by making it a farce. 

'V\v: (Jown, in a bluf- cowl, and bearing the Italian 
/lag instead of a black on':, comes in, followed by four 



230 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

men in white cowls. These place Ninus on the bier, 
where his arms stand out on each side stiff and stark. 
The requiem is sung in the usual chant, the words only 
being original : " Tibi, Tibi, tavi ! sei morto, perche 
non hai piu fiato " (" You are dead because you have 
no breath in you "). The processions consist in turning 
the bier round and round till they are all giddy, and 
the audience bursts into a chorus of laughter. It is a 
curious fact that in ancient Rome the buffoon (mimic) 
was always a personage in the funeral processions of 
great persons, so perhaps this is not meant for burlesque 
after all. 

After a few more minor scenes, the daughter appears, 
fainting in her chair, from beneath the quilts, just as 
she made her exit. Waking up, she begins to abuse 
Semiramide ; after which she makes a passionless and 
business-like effort to kill herself with a dagger, but the 
ambassador, who has been too busy with the affairs of 
the state all the time to do more than look at her, now 
rushes forward, pulls the dagger out of her hand, and 
gives her the pleasant alternative of marrying him 
instead of espousing death, which she, smiling Serenely, 
with her arms akimbo, accepts forthwith. This scene 
might have been too touching had not the clown saved 



THE GIOSTRA. 231 



the sensibilities of the audience by exclaiming, " L'avevo 
fatta mia" ("I wanted her myself"), and, tumbling down, 
rolls out like a ready-made mummy. The queen ulti- 
mately finds her spouse, and, in token of welcome, gives 
vent to her feelings in countless shakes on her five 
minor tones. He tells his adventures, and she relates 
hers ; after which she arranges the crown on his head, 
and places him on the vacant throne, to the detriment 
of Ninus's royal mantle. The crown is some trouble 
to him, till he goes behind the scenes to have it 
adjusted with twine. 

The old enemy crops up again : the tributary king 
refuses to pay tribute, and war is again declared. 
Almiro goes forth with his crown on the top of his 
helmet, and Semiramide dons her armour. The chal- 
lenge is given in pentatonic numbers, the Italian flag 
waves in the hands of the Ninevites' standard-bearer, 
and the rhythmic battle is carried on in the same 
methodical manner as the last, and with the same effect. 
The tributary king hands his crown to Semiramide, 
who returns it ; all his men give up their swords, and 
receive them again, on which they all shake hands, and 
the drama is over. The clown executes a />as seiiL 
The herald appears with bouquet and handkerchief. 



7 //A GJOS'J RA. 233 



and speaks the epilogue, in the same manner as the 
prologue, only with this difference, that now he tells 
them what they have seen, and then he informed them 
what they would see. He moralizes, shaking his 
agonized countenance and drawling out his verses, till 
the clown makes an end of it by proposing a dance, and 
the whole dramatis personce are soon threading the 
mazes of the " Trescone," a national Tuscan dance, in 
which the clown does wonders of agility, and the king's 
crown has to be dispensed with, the dance consisting 
in much winding of the arms above the head. 

So that is what the chivalresque name of Giostra is 
given to In these degenerate times in sunny Italy ! Yet, 
through all its crudities and absurdities, there is a strong 
reminiscent interest. One seems taken back a few 
hundred years in the world ; the wooden stage is not 
only like the scaffolding at Blackfriars, round which an 
open-mouthed crowd listened to the " Merchant of 
Venice" and "Hamlet" in the days of Shakspeare, 
but is like the wooden platform which was used in 
Rome and Etruria before the great theatres, whose 
ruins we know so well, were built. On such a platform 
the plays of the Tuscan tragedian Voltumnio, men- 
tioned by Varro, might have been acted on these very 



234 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

Tuscan hills. On such a stage the more ancient 
Atellan plays might have been performed when first 
introduced by the Oscans. Micali speaks of the Atellan 
plays as being burlesque farces, where the manners and 
customs are exposed with that characteristic natural- 
ness which pleases the people. The favourite comic 
characters were Macco and Bucco (Maccius and 
Buccius), the prototypes of the modern Pulcinello and 
Arlecchino. 

There is a scenic representation of these characters 
acting in company with a serious performer on the 
walls of Pompeii. 

It would be interesting to know if these classic 
comicalities have anything to do with the buffoon who 
takes the tragedy out of every scene of the Giostra of 
Semiramide. 



CHAPTER V. 




^be Mushroom Merchants in 
the Hppennines. 

HE dampness of the rains coming in the 
warm season, has produced a most prolific 
crop of mushrooms. The people of the 
Nook and of Piteglio are making fortunes, 
according to the mountain idea of riches. I was told 
that at Piteglio the joint profits of this year have been 
several thousand francs. The mushroom season just 
comes in between the wheat harvest and the chestnut 
gathering, and if the season be good, it is nearly as 
profitable as the other crops. Whilst the men are 
threshing corn on the ajas, or digging up the ground 
with the huge adze which does duty for a plough. 



MUSHROOM MERCHANTS IN THE APENNINES. 1^7 

the women, girls, and boys get up at sunrise, and 
wander about the chestnut woods in search of fimghi.. 
If you wonder at the strangeness of their garments, 
know that it is considered lucky to wear one's clothes 
inside out on a mushroom excursion. 

The contents of their baskets on their return would 
also astonish you considerably, for the Italian edible 
mushrooms are many, and brilliantly coloured ; they, 
however, reject our English edible species as a toad- 
stool, and we were threatened with dire disasters when 
we persisted in cooking some fine specimens. 

The favourite kind here is the Ceppattello, a 
large brown fungus, with a greenish white spongy 
substance beneath. 

The largest specimens are cut up (stalk and all) by 
housewives, and after being dried in the sun for some 
days, are put into paper bags and preserved dry for 
winter use ; the little button-shaped ones, called some- 
times " porcini," are chosen as the best to preserve 
under oil, after having been put into boiling vinegar 
and then dried. They make a very good condiment. 
to eat with the lesso (bouilli), or with cold meat. 

Another very savoury mushroom is the Ovolo, 
a large handsome fungus, orange red above, prim- 



238 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

rose yellow beneath. It is called ovolo. or egg- 
shaped, because it comes up in an oval form covered 
with a thick white lilm, through which the yellow part 
rises and expands, the white film being transformed 
into a frill round the stalk. Then there are certain 
carmine red tiat-topped finig/ii, with yellow rays be- 
neath, called by the mountaineers fa!nig-/io/L and the 
Claviari, which look like branches of coralline ; the 
^rifoh, a mass of fan-shaped fungus, of a dark or 
grey colour ; this is so hard that it is not eatable 
unless it is first boiled and then baked. But the 
species w^hich most suggests poison to our English 
minds, are large yellow masses of soft substance, 
called also grifolc, or more correctly poliporo, some of 
which are yellow of the most brilliant colour, and 
•others which the peasants call Lmgua di castagno 
(chestnut tongues), of a bright carmine. All the last 
four species grow on chestnut or oak trees, springing 
from the bark. 

The mushroom merchants are doincr a brisk busi- 
ness this year. They come round to all the villages 
and hamlets every morning, and buy up all they can 
get, piling them on a large cart in flat baskets one on 
the other, to sell to the wholesale dealers. When 



MUSHROOM MERCHANTS IN THE APENNINES. 239 

only one merchant arrives he makes his own price, 
and it is a hard bargain for the villagers, who only get 
about four or ^w^i centesimi (less than a halfpenny) 
per lb. 

This morning an impromptu market is established 
on the aja of Pietro, and a most amusing scene it is. 
About twenty women from neighbouring hamlets 
stand about, each guarding her baskets of funghi, and 
oh ! good luck ! two rival merchants. There is the 
usual keen-eyed man from San Marcello, and a care- 
for-nought style of youth who has come down from 
Prunetta to do a little business. This fellow has 
black eyes and a mass of ugly black hair, which re- 
quires much shaking and thrusting back under his hat. 
He wears a pink shirt and blue tie, and smokes a 
meerschaum pipe which does not at all interfere with 
the freedom of his speech, for he talks incessantly. 

There is fierce bidding between them, the young 
purchaser recklessly promising more than his rival, 
till he had raised the offers from four centesimi a lb. 
to six-and-a-half. Here the elder man prudently re- 
tired from the contest, saying that he could not get 
that back for them in P""lorence. 

Accordingly all the women flocked eagerly to the 



240 TUSCAN SKETCHES. , 

youth from Prunetta, who began weighing their 
baskets very wilHngly on his steel-yard, which these 
itinerant buyers carry about with them. He would 
willingly cheat them in the payment, but is kept to 
his bargain by his rival, who, having no purchases, 
stands by to see fair play. A brisk trade continues 
till the elder man shoulders his scale and departs, 
when lo ! what a Babel ensues. 

" Now hark ye, donne" cries the buyer, "these are 
not real prices, you know. I only paid high to keep 
him out of it," pointing to the departing rival, " but 
the market price is five centesimi, and not one more 
cent will I pay." 

Great excitement ensues. All the women lift up 
their voices shrilly, and the appellations they bestow 
on him are not remarkable for politeness ; they sur- 
round him in a crowd, shaking their fists in his face, 
till he retreats to the wall, where he takes off his hat, 
and, pushing back his curls, awaits the lulling of the 
storm. 

"It is not fair ; you cannot bargain for one price 
and pay another ; you paid Enrichetta six-and-a-half 
a lb. and you shall pay me the same," exclaimed a 
stout angry woman. 



MUSHROOM MERCHANTS IN THE APENNINES. 241; 

" I shall go to Piteglio with mine, and you shan't 
have an ounce of them. I would rather give them to 
an honest man than sell them to you." And up goes 
a large basket on the frizzled head of a red-haired girl, 
but it comes down again on her friends reminding her 
that she will only get four-and-a-half centesimi there, 
and have all the trouble of carrying them a mile. 

"Then I'll sell them to the other man, he offered 
five-and-a-half" She rushes off, followed by two or 
three others calling, " O Giorgio, come back ! come 
back!" 

Giorgio, who had not really gone away, strolls back 
in an unconcerned manner, and coolly inquires, 
''What is up?" 

"That birbone won't give more than five centesimi 
now, so we will let you have them at five-and-a-half" 

•' Ah ! " says he, " but I am not going to give more 
than five either." Sig. Giorgio was a student of 
human nature, and seeing that the women were too 
angry with his rival to deal at any price, he knew he 
might make his own tariff now. 

" Oh ! that's too bad, you offered five-and-a-half just 
now," cried our nice little Matilde. 

" Just so, but you would not deal ; now he has 

16 



242 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

changed his mind, and so have I." and the mushroom 
merchant laughs sardonically. 

In despair the Avomen consult together. "Shall 
we go to Piteglio ? perhaps the man from Pistoja is 
there," asks one. 

" No, he isn't ; there is only Lulgi il Pazzo buying 
there to-day." 

" Besides," adds a third, " he only pays five centcsimi, 
and we should have all the walk besides." 

" My basket is heavy, I shall lighten it here." laughs 
the red-haired girl, showing all her white teeth. 

The others follow her example, and the remaining' 
stock is weighed and haggled over to the very last 
ounce of yellow ovoli, but the merchant is very much 
at a loss for small change to pay his many clients. 

So little accustomed is he to any but the very 

dirtiest of paper money, that when T changed 

a five-franc note into bright new silver half-francs, 
he looked quite incredulous, and asked whether they 
were good ! 

We were told by one of the women that the people 
of Piteglio — a village in which there is neither butcher 
nor baker — have this year gained several thousand 
francs by their mushrooms, the joint gathering of the 



MUSHROOM MEkCIfAN'/S IN Till: A/'JlNNINES. 245 

village being nearly 3,000 lbs. a day. It is a blessed 
provision of Providena- that in these regions, 
where, by reason of the mountainous nature of the 
land, agriculture is both difficult and unproductive^ 
that the chief means of sustenance are drawn from 
nature alone, and man only has to gather. The 
chestnuts supply him with food for the whole winter, 
the woods and hedges give into his hands mushrooms,, 
bilberries, and raspberries enough to make up the few- 
francs which are necessary for his clothing. 




THE PRIEST S VISIT, 




CHAPTER VI. 

H ni^ountain jpuneraL 

"The Nook," August yth, 1885. 
00 R old Beppa, handsome Domenico's 
mother, has been for many months pass- 
ing slowly Into the realms of death. A 
winter cough and spring weakness have, 
by the time that the summer heats arrived, changed 
into utter prostration. When we arrived at The 
Nook we found her sinking, and all the beef-tea and 
wine we could supply only restored her for a little 

time. Even the doctor whom T insisted on 

sending for declared his inability to do anything at 
this late stage. Sometimes the weak heart caused 
a species of fainting, and this her family invariably 
mistook for death. Then her youngest daughter, 



246 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

Emilia, was despatched post haste to the neighbouring 
village for the priest, for a good mountaineer does not 
think a doctor at all indispensable in severe illness, 
but the idea of dying without the priest would be 
dreadful to him. So the priest came sometimes before 
daybreak, sometimes at nightfall, when he generally 
had to stay all night in the comfortless cottage ; but 
though he duly said prayers for her and laid his stole 
on the bed as a ^wn that she died in the arms of the 
Church, yet time after time Beppa came back to life 
again. For days the good priest scarcely dared to 
leave home lest a call to The Nook might come ; 
but after several fruitless alarms he decided not to 
neglect any more the outlying districts of his parish, 
and so he departed for Riobujo. Scarcely had he 
gone than Emilia came flying across the valley to 
fetch the priest, for " mother was really dying ! " The 
consternation in The Nook was dreadful when she 
rushed back with the news that the prete was away 
for the day ! What was to be done ? She could not 
be allowed to die without prayers and candles ! So 
all the hamlet was roused. Giulio Bettoni — as the 
greater scholar and nearer to the priesthood, on the 
strength of having been an acolyte in his boyhood — 



A MOUNTAIN FUNERAL. 247 

brought his mass-book, and, with his Sunday coat on, 
walked solemnly down the village to Beppa's house. 
All the women donned \}^€\xfesta dresses and hunted 
out the ends of wax candles they had saved from 
funeral processions, and assembled round the bed of 
the old woman. Giulio read the prayers for a passing 
soul with a high monotonous voice, and the women 
stood with their lighted tapers all round the bed of 
the darkened room. The married daughter from 
Mammiano, who had only arrived this morning, was 
weeping at the head of the bed, and with trembling 
hands held a crucifix before her gasping mother. The 
two younger ones were weeping in the next room. 
Her husband, the bearded Pietro, had hidden himself 
out of the house, with the usual Italian instinct of 
•avoiding any disagreeable emotion. The good son, 
who had been the best and most tender nurse of all, 
still kept his place on her left, and, now wiping the 
dews off her forehead, then waving a fan to keep the 
flies away, gave his whole heart to easing the pains 
of his mother. 

Such was the scene that the " Signora," as the 
villagers call the English lady, came upon one 
morning. She knelt down solemnly with the rest; 



248 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

but when, as usual, she put her hand on the dying- 
woman's pulse, she found that death was not so near 
after all — the faintness was passing. 

"You can wait for the priest, after all," she said; 
*' Beppa has quite a strong pulse." 

" But look at her face, Signora ; she is dying," said 
Giulio, half closing his book. 

"She has one of her heart attacks, but it is passing;"" 
and the Signora, putting a spoonful of her broth to the 
lips of the patient, found it swallowed, and repeated It,, 
till she said faintly, "Grazie, Signora, I am better again 
now." 

Domenico pressed the hand of the visitor, and 
went softly away to get over the revulsion of feeling. 
Giulio shut his book, the women blew out their 
candles, and went one by one away, to put on their 
working garments and go to the fields. 

At last there came a day when she recovered no 
more from the faintness ; but the priest was there, and 
the faithful old soul was led by him to the brink of the 
dark river. 

August 8///, 1886. 

Interment follows death very quickly In Italy, and 
this evening the corpse, which has been surrounded 



A MOUNTAIN FUNERAL. 249. 

by lighted tapers and watched by faithful friends all 
night, is now ready for burial. It lies on the table of 
the cottage room, dressed in its best print gown and 
brightest kerchief, and a crucifix clasped in its hands. 

Domenico and his sisters are weeping around, and 
neighbour after neighbour comes in to look seriously 
on the still, worn old face at rest. Outside on the aja^. 
the poor old bent " Atropos" sits on the low wall and 
shakes her palsied head, murmuring that " it was her 
turn before Beppa's, and that she ought to have beerk 
called first." Then she sighs, "Ah! why does not 
God want me too ? " 

The children of the villa have spent all their 
morning in making a cross of flowers, which looks 
quite important when finished, and the two elder girls 
find some black veils and white frocks, and depart ta 
join the procession. 

We go to the old church of the Pieve, and from the 
outside pulpit are able to watch the procession the 
whole way across the valley. The Pieve — which lies 
half way between The Nook and Piteglio, its mother 
parish — is a rendezvous for others besides ourselves. 
From our exalted situation up the pulpit steps we see 
a little knot of people assembling beneath the spread- 



250 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

ing chestnut just below us. There are a number of 
men in their fustian working clothes, and of boys with 
jackets or without, and every one carries a little white 
bundle under his arm. One very old man carefully 
puts his white bundle as a cushion on a large stone, 
and sinks down tired out. " Oi ! Oi ! " he exclaims, 
^' my poor old legs won't carry me any more. It will 
be my turn to be carried to the Campo Santo next." 

" Here they come !" cries a boy, pointing to a string 
of white figures coming down the woodland path from 
Piteglio, on the other side of the little valley. Then 
•ensues a general stir and flutter, all the white bundles 
are shaken out, and lo ! they turn into ephods, with 
which every man girds himself, and instead of a knot 
•of shabby-looking peasants, they seem transformed 
into mediaeval saints. A very dirty old man forthwith 
becomes a venerable pilgrim — the ragged little children 
are cherubs clad in celestial white. There is a large 
assembly of women and children, and the mothers are 
very busy putting white shirts over the tiny breeches 
of the baby boys in lieu of the girded ephod. 

Then comes the priest with the black banner grimly 
■decorated with skull and cross-bones, and a long file of 
white-robed men following. All the assembly beneath 



A MOUNTAIN FUNERAL. 251 

LIS falls into rank, and the whole company march, like 
the white penitents of days gone by, amidst the corn, 
and are lost in the shadow of the trees round The 
Nook, where they are gone to fetch Beppa. 

After a time, a distant sound of chanting and a 
glimmer of lights tell us that the procession is coming 
back. As it draws near, the women in the path and 
on the green in front of the disused church sink on 
their knees, with their babes in their arms and little 
girls clinging to their aprons, and we do the same. In 
front come 130 white-robed men and boys in couples, 
in diminishing file, till they end in tiny toddles hand- 
in-hand. Then the priest and his acolytes chanting ; 
next the two girls from the villa, with a little child 
between them carrying the floral cross uplifted ; then 
the bier carried by men in white ephods, and accom- 
panied by eight women in black veils carrying candles; 
then more women with tapers. 

Nothing can be more lovely or poetical than this 
long procession of simple peasants through the winding 
paths of the cornfield, down the valley where the 
evening sun tints their white robes rosy red, and 
next across the bridge into the deep shadows of the 
dark wood on the other side, and then toiling with 



252 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

laboured steps up the steep street to the church. It 
is like an acted allegory of the soul's passage through 
life and death. 

The bells ring ^' a doppio',' a stormy pealing all 
together ; the church is reached, and the black cloth 
cover being removed from the bier, the assembled 
crowd take their last look at the quiet old face, while 
the priest reads the prayers and sprinkles her with 
holy water. Then the tapers are extinguished, and 
the last journey is made to the Campo Santo, where a 
coffin awaits. She is tenderly lifted in and nailed 
down, and deposited in the newly-dug grave. 

Two friends of the family, who followed behind the 
procession with mysterious little baskets on their arms,, 
according to custom, now go about among the crowd 
giving pennies to each white-robed person, and to the 
holders of candles. All this is Domenico's g€nerosity,. 
for he will not stint his last expense for his mother. 
Many of the intimate friends return the money after- 
wards, but most of them keep it. Domenico and his 
friends keep vigil in the empty house, the daughters 
fly to their neighbours for comfort and consolation — 
and so poor old Beppa has passed out of our lives. 



CHAPTER VII. 

H jflorentine Hftarket 




Parisian aspect. 



Florence, 1884. 
OLD Florence is fast disap- 
pearing. The characteristic 
I narrow streets, where the mid- 
day sun only shines down 
through an irregular sky-line 
of picturesque eaves and gar- 
goyles nearly meeting over- 
head, are, one by one, being 
widened into grand, new 
streets which take a gay 
Grim old palaces put on new 



faces, and only their general solidity and name pre- 



254 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

serves the aroma of antiquity. Now a square, iron- 
beamed market-place has arisen, which is to substitute 
that quaint, bewildering, parti-coloured, semi-mediaeval 
conglomeration of human life and curiosities which 
has for century on century been the mercantile heart 
of Florence. The old market, and its twin sister the 
Ghetto, are both doomed to destruction — they are, in 
fact, to be offered as a sacrifice to the modern deity,. 
" Hygiene." It is right and just that this should be 
so, but before they disappear from our midst some 
slight picture of the old Florence, which will never be 
seen again, should be preserved. The Ghetto and 
Mercato Vecchio stand side by side, a mass of lurid 
tenements, with black walls and small windows, piled 
story upon story in narrow streets almost cavernous 
in their darkness, and propped house against house by 
flying buttresses high in air and gloomy archways 
nearer earth. Among these dismal abodes are larger 
and more imposing houses, with remains of ancient 
towers, and sculptured arms and ensigns of extinct 
guilds on their time-worn fa9ades : these are the old 
palaces where the potentates of the Middle Ages and 
the rich burghers of the commonwealth lived in state, 
for this district which is now given over to squalid 



A FLORENTINE MARKET. 255; 

poverty was once the very city of Florence. There 
is this difference between the last fate of what we have 
called twin sisters — the Ghetto keeps all her abject, 
mysteries shrouded from the light of day, for no one 
dares to penetrate her gloomy cellars and the cavernous, 
alleys which hide in these days, not the despised Jews, 
but all the wretched, hopeless population whose doings^ 
morally and actually, shun the light of day ; while the 
old market close by is still the chief artery of moderni 
life, and is crowded from morn till eve with a never 
ceasing stream of buyers and sellers. In the Ghetto^ 
are squalid old men and women who have never seen 
the sunlight, and who look on rain as a strange 
phenomenon, for they have passed a life in the dark 
cellars, from whence they dare not emerge. All the 
countless families draw their water from one well in 
the midst of a dark piazza, and this piazza seems ta 
have represented the outer world to most of them. It 
has long ceased to be the prison of the Jews, who 
were confined within its gates in 15 71 by Cosimo I. — 
for in these days the Jews are a great power in the 
city — but misery, crime, and want lurk there instead. 

The old market keeps better company — the arch- 
bishop's palace is in its precincts, a church stands at 



^56 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

•each corner, and in its narrow streets are the decaying 
palaces of the Tornaquinci, Vecchietti, Amieri, Neri, 
Medici, and half the names glorious in Florentine 
story. A dim memory lingers of a marvellous palace 
built by the Tosinghi, about a.d. iioo, the tower of 
which was covered with rows of little Lombard galleries 
with white marble colonnettes like the tower of Pisa — 
this has passed away, but less ancient beauties re- 
main. There is the Vecchietti palace, where John of 
Bologna's black demon grins in endless hideousness, 
at the corner where the Devil himself galloped by, on 
a black horse when exorcised by St. Peter Martyr. It 
was in this house that John of Bologna was sheltered 
when he came as a foreign artist to study in Florence, 
and its owner was his most liberal patron. But the 
Vecchietti palace has older memories than these. 
There lived the " Cavolaja," or cabbage seller, who in 
mediaeval times had made a fortune by selling the 
produce of her podere in the old market, and at 
her death ordered the bells of the cathedral and All 
Saints' Church to be rung for her soul from All Saints' 
Day to the end of Carnival. Her bones are said to 
be in the tomb of Bishop Ranieri in the Baptistery, 
though history does not explain how they got there. 



A FLORENTINE MARKET. 257 

The Amieri palaces form quite a district of the 
Mercato ; their half-demoh'shed towers date from Ghi- 
belline times, and the last Amieri, Bernardo di Nicolo, 
is known to fame as the father of Genevra, whose 
story is one of the quaintest legends of Florence. 
Refused the lover of her choice, and betrothed by 
force to Francesco Agolanti, she afterwards fell a vic- 
tim to the plague in 1400. Believed to be dead, she 
was placed in the family vault in the cemetery by the 
cathedral. She awoke from her swoon on a bright 
moonlight night, and, bursting her bandages, escaped 
from her ghastly prison, and, clad in her shroud, went 
to her husband's house. He exorcised her as a spirit, 
and refused to open his door. Her father did the 
same, and no one would afford shelter to her resusci- 
tated person but the family of her first lover. The 
marriage with Agolanti was decreed by the tribunals 
to be annulled by her death and burial, and she was 
by this curious quip released to begin a happier life 
with Rondinelli, her first love. To this day the street 
she trod on that moonlit night is called " Via della 
Morte." 

Another interesting house in the old market is that 
of the Castiglioni, which has some fine old sculptured 

17 



2S8 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

doorways and chimney-pieces. Dante Castiglione was 
a famous person at the time of the siege of Florence, 
1529, not so much for his prowess in war as for a 
duel he and Martelli fought, against Bandini and his 
second in rivalry for the smiles of a belle named 
Marietta de' Ricci. As the combatants belonged to 
the two opposite parties who were striving for supre- 
macy in Florence, the duel (or double duel — there 
being four combatants) assumed a political importance, 
and was taken by the superstitious Florentines as an 
omen of the fate of the war. 

Other interesting buildings are the houses which 
were once head-quarters of the different guilds. Here 
is the striped shield of the Linajoli or flax merchants ; 
there, the arms of the Calimala or wool-dressers. Now 
one sees the lamb and banner of the guild of wool {Arte 
aella Lana), then the {vaio) ermine of the Pellicceria 
or furriers. In one of these latter, Benvenuto Cellini 
lived. As for works of art, has not the old market 
one of Luca della Robbia's loveliest conceptions, in 
the relief of the Madonna and Child of the lunette of 
the Church of S. Piero Buonconcilio ? — the purest 
faced Madonna and most delicious baby which that 
master of infantile modelling ever conceived, And 



A FLORENTINE MARKET. 259 



boasted it not once of Donatello's statue of Abun- 
dance on its central column ? And has not our good 
old Vasari built a Greek peristyle without a temple to 
shelter the vendors of unsavoury fish ? But now to 
glance at the aspect of the place as a market. 

Could anything be more picturesque than the antique 
old gabled roofs, and the stalls beneath them with 
yellow awnings, which seem to absorb the sunlight, 
and yet shadow the piles of vegetables and baskets of 
fruit of every hue under the sun. Why, the very 
cabbages ring the changes on all the reds, yellows, and 
greens almost to blue-black! then the crimson and 
orange strings of capsicums festooned across the 
heaps of scarlet tomatoes, the rich purple of the pear- 
shaped /^^r^;^^^^;,^; and the mingled hues of the pome- 
granate, make the greengrocer's stall under the yellow 
shadow a feast of colour as well as a study of life. 

Though we see all our old English friends of the 
vegetable kingdom, yet there are so many unknown 
herbs that we wonder what they are, and whether 
they are good for food. Here comes a poor tottering 
old woman, and putting down a bit of copper as big 
as a farthing asks for - two centesimi of raciicc/no "— 
the leaves of the garden chicory. She spends a like 



26o TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

coin in a crust of bread at a baker's, and there is her 
breakfast complete — bread and salad for less than a 
penny. 

There Is a pert serving-maid, looking very pretty 
under her black lace veil ; she spends several minutes 
bargaining for some lentils, and at length goes off 
with a parcel of those little brown seeds, of which she 
will make a puree to garnish the grand joint at her 
master's dinner table. This esteemed dish is a " zatu- 
p07ic" a pig's leg. bound and stuffed with meat, like 
a Bologna sausage, and smothered under a brown 
mash of lentils. 

But what is that keen-eyed man-cook buying ? Cer- 
tain pear-shaped shining vegetables of a rich purple 
colour. Such thinsfs were never eaten in old Enoland. 
They are called petronciani, and are the fruit of the 
" Solaiimn insaniim^' or " mad apples." They are first 
boiled till tender, then cut into slices, dipped in egg, 
and fried. 

A sharp- faced old servant comes up, throws a quick 
glance round the stall, and muttering, "What, no 
gobbi, to-day ? I shall have to go back to Menica 
after all," and away she hurries. What are gobbi, do 
you suppose ? They are a favourite vegetable in 



A FLORENTINE MARKET. 261 

Italy, and are nothing but the stalks of the artichoke, 
tied up in bundles like celery. They may be eaten 
boiled, and served with melted butter, or cut into 
pieces, and fried in eggs and bread crumbs ; and are 
excellent either way, the taste being something be- 
tween celery and seakale. 

Another favourite Italian vegetable consists of the 
knots of young leaves on the stalks of the fennel ; but 
the flavour is too strong to suit an English taste. 
There are also some very small kinds of vegetable- 
marrow, about as large as apples, which are very 
good. 

Here comes another purchaser, who asks for ceci^ 
and goes away with a pocket of round, yellow seeds, 
like over-grown peas, which were taken wet from a 
barrel of salt water. The plant which produces them 
is the Cicer Arietinum (English — ram's head, or chick 
pea). A very good " soup maigre " is made from 
them ; but if your olfactory organs are delicate, it 
will be advisable not to assist at the cooking of them, 
for they emit a strong odour, like salt cod. The 
Italians live largely on leguminous plants ; the num- 
bers of different beans they use is quite remarkable ; 
they vary in colour from the white haricot to dark red, 



-62 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

and even dark brown species. If a working man can 
get a few beans, either hot or cold, with oil and 
vinegar, he is quite content to dine without meat ; and 
if a few of the greenish yellow fungJii are added, he 
thinks it a meal fit for a king. 

But what is this man calling as he comes slowly up 
the crowded market-street, shouting '' Salati, salati'' 
(salted). A little boy hearing the cry begins to 

sing— 

" Son salati i miei lupini, 
Son salati dalla dama." 

" My lupins are salted by my true love ; " and he 
pulls a minute brown coin out of his pocket, and 
quickly exchanges it for the large flat, yellow lupin 
seeds, which the man has in a flat, wooden tub. There 
is scarcely a street corner in Florence at which you 
will not see the inevitable vendor of lupins, who is 
largely patronized by the working classes. The 
lupins are eaten after being kept in brine, but they 
are not cooked. 

In the matter of salad, Italian tastes are as wide as 
in leguminous vegetables. They eat chicory and sorrel 
leaves, basil leaves, lettuce, endives, beetroot, dandelion, 
and cold cabbage. And a favourite salad is a grassy- 



A FLORENTINE MARKET. 263 

looking plant, which they call barba di cappuccini (or 
Capuchin s beard), known in England as " buck's 
horn," "goat's beard," or "star of the earth." The 
Italians have classical authority for eating this, for 
Dioscorides said in his time th& planiago coronopus was 
eaten cooked ; the only difference is, that the moderns 
do not trouble to cook it. 

The fruit stall, which is often distinct from the 
vegetable seller's, contains quite as many specimens 
which are strange to English eyes. 

Side by side with yellow apricots lies the cactus 
fruit, or prickly pear. Be sure that you don't attempt 
to eat It, or even to touch it, without a knife, for the 
harmless little brown spots which dot its ruddy sur- 
face are each composed of a thousand invisible thorns 
which have a knack of entering the skin on the 
smallest provocation. The correct manner of eating 
a prickly pear is to cut off the two ends, then cut 
down the outer rind, and laying it open, take out the 
inner pulp. Here are two baskets full of russet brown 
fruits ; one familiar enough is the common medlar, but 
the other is shaped like a pear. It is the fruit of the 
pyrus sorbtis (service tree). When fresh, they look 
like bright coloured pears ; we were shown large 



2^4 TL'SCAA' SA'ETVNES, 

bunches of them hung up in tho shop, but tht y art' 
only good to cat when niollo\\ od b)- keeping till bi*o\Yn 
as a ripe medlar, and have a nuich richer tlavoin- than 
that fruit. A basket of red, velvety-looking berries, 
similar to strawberries, only rounder, next attracts us : 
they are arbutus berries, and when quite v\\k" avc really 
very good to eat. 

The children arc tond K.'^i another wild tniit. called 
j^itti^j^fo/e (jujube trccV They arc glossv brown berries, 
with a soft, green pulp within. The o\ al rt\l berries of 
the '• cornel chcrrv " are also greatly .ippr(.\'iatc\l by 
children. The Romans also knew this chcrrN , but they 
grew it chielly for the wood, from whicli their lances 
and arrows were made. 

But the most cooling and delicious truit oi .ill is the 
Japanese m's/o/o, a yellow medlar, with a delicious acid 
taste ; they conu^ In as soon .is the warm weather 
begins, and are the favourite rcMreslu^ners until the 
water-melon takes their ['>Lice. 

There are also different nuts eaten here. Besides 
walnuts, hazelnuts, chestnuts (which make a dozen 
different kinds oi foods), we h.ive the pinoli and the 
nocc di Brasil. Pinoli are the little kernels k^K the 
cone c^i the stone pine. They are remarkably good in 



A I'fJ)l;J:N'JJM': MARKJ'ir. 



26s 



h ii 



flavour, having a slight aromatic taste. They are ob- 
tained Ly placing the pine cone in an oven, when the 
heat causes the scales to open, and the nuts are easily 
shaken out and cracked with a hammer. The Erasil 
nut is a curious little pair of twin yellow berries in a 
brownish husk ; the flavour is rich and aromatic. 

A walk through the Italian >^^ 

market will certainly produce 
the thought that the English 
might vary and economize 
their food much more than 
they do. 

At those old cook-shops, 
in which the Florentines of 
three or four centuries ago 
were wont to dine, and where '■■^fC,.r-' 
the ancient plates and dishes 
they used are preserved on 
shelves on the walls, one sees the most curious 
processes of cooking. Over the fire a large wheel 
revolves, on which are trussed rows of fowls, thrushes, 
and larks, the latter alternated with bits of bread, 
pork, and sage leaves. In the frying-pans are 
savoury messes of yellow polenta, made from the ma\ze 




A MIOI.IACCIO SELLER. 



266 TC/SCA.Y SA'£7X:H£S. 

flour, frying in oil. and oi' brown mio/i'acn'o, a cake of 
chestnut flour, and piles of nicely cooked friffo^ the 
materials for which are endless, ranging- the vegetable 
and animal kinofdom. 

As for economy, we might learn a great deal from a 
Florentine cook. For instance, when we truss a fowl, 
we make no use of the liver, except by displaying it 
under the \ving. As for the cock's comb, and other 
appendages to the head and neck of chanticleer, we 
consider them refuse. Not so the Italian ; he calls 
them regalia, cuts them up and stews them with the 
liver in luscious gravy, and makes one oi the most 
stylish entrc'cs for a dinner party, either by filling a 
vol-au-vcjif with them, or in a shape of stewed rice, 
called risotto con regalia. 

A fowl will, in the poulterer's hands, serve several 
customers, for marketino- is done on the infinitesimal 
system. The two bits oft' the breast are bought sepa- 
rately as a dish for an invalid or a./rieassd" for an eiitri'c. 
Then the carcase is sold for roasting or making soup,, 
the legs and neck are purchased for a few centesimi by 
the poor, and the combs and livers go to the tables of 
the rich as reowlia. 

The fish market presents equally curious specimens 



A I'LOREN'IINli MANKE'i: 267 

of food. The sepm, or cuttle fish, is much liked, and 
you see its long arms, with their curious rows of 
circular disks, lyinj^ about in all directions. 

You will never find a mackerel ; and if a salmon be 
visible, it has been imported for the benefit of some 
English Midas, at ten francs the Tuscan pound of 
twelve ounces. But there are large-headed, three-sided 
fish called naselli, which are as good as whiting, and a 
large kind of cod called palombo. Lobsters, as we know 
them, do not appear, but there are huge crawfish, larger 
than any lobster, and looking like magnified shrimps. 
It is a fashion to fry the very small shrimps in their 
shells, and eat them crisp and entire. 

Frogs' legs also make a very delicate dish ol frit to. 
Indeed, what will not an Italian make delicious in a fry. 

A dish of dainty morsels, fried in butter, of a pale 
brown, is placed before you, and its contents will prove 
a perfect riddle. Probably there will be melon flowers, 
bits of every vegetable imaginable, celery, morsels of 
calves' brain and marrow, tiny lamb chops, sweetbreads, 
liver, artichoke, bits of fennel, &c., &c. Nothing comes 
amiss to the frying-pan when ^friito misto is required. 
But our marketing is over; we have got back to the 
kitchen, so we will leave the cook to her mysteries. 



-6S TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

Florence, 1887. 

Since this was written, the rehictant Florentines have 
been driven by force oi municipal law to use the iron- 
bound modern market-place in San Lorenzo ; and the 
six hundred families crowded into that human hive o'i 
misery called the Ghetto have been turned out into 
more healthy abodes, in disused convents or model 
houses for the poor, where it is hoped that new in- 
fluences and fresh air will brino- new moral and 
physical health to them. The empty Ghetto has 
been the exploring ground oi artists and physiologists ; 
it has been the scene of carnival gaiety, when the 
artists with their magic brushes transformed it into the 
**City of Bagdad," and illuminated its darkest mysteries 
and gloomiest caverns with electric light. This year 
it is to undergo another transformation under these 
artists' hands, and to represent " Cinque-Cento Flo- 
rence," with Donatello at work in his studio ; after 
which both Ghetto and ^Mercato are to tail under the 
reforming touch of improvement. Florence will lose 

its most characteristic remnants of mediaevalism, and 
gain in a sanitary and moral aspect. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



Zbc Castle of Belcaro. 




E have been revelling in remnants of the 
Middle Ages during three days, prowling 
about that most delightful of mediaeval 
cities, Siena ; and to-day we are going- 
outside the walls and down the ridges of the extinct 
volcano which forms the city, into the undulating land 
spread wide below. It is a country like a petrified 
sea, with all its waves carved in tufo, and covered 
here and there in verdure and foliage. 

We are told by the guide-books that Belcaro is only 
three miles' drive, or one and a half to walk, from the 
gate of the city ; but as we sweep round curve after 
curve of the changing road, now through flowery corn- 



270 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 



fields, then by the broom-blossomed ravines of ruddy 
tufo cliffs — here plunging down a steep descent into a 
valley, there toiling round a cypress-clad hill, Belcaro 
seems to recede from our gaze, in fact it has not even 
yet come within view. At last we espy a great fortress 
on a distant point, and we slowly make our way round 
the wooded ravine that lies between. We seem to be 
in every country at once — on our right are English 
meadows ; on the left are French vineyards, with their 
rows of low-trained vines. A bit of Lombard land- 
scape comes next — rows of tufty poplars in a green 
plain, then a forest of stone pines that seems trans- 
planted from Ravenna. At length we plunge into a 
veritable Devonshire lane, narrow, brambly, full of dog 
roses, ferns, and blackberry bushes ; and then emerge 
on an aerial table-land, and see the three tiers of walls 
rise in circles round the mediaeval castle of Belcaro. 
They remind one of the walls of Ecbatana in 
Herodotus, for they are like belts of different colours : 
the first is clothed in all its height with green ilexes, 
so cut and trimmed that they seem a very living wall ; 
the next is of yellowish stone, the third of ruddy 
bricks. Mysterious postern-doors and dark arched 
entrances come to view among the ilexes as we wind 



THE CASTLE OF BELCARO. 271 

round the hill to reach the great gates. An inquiring 
porter or cicerone meets us in the castellated court- 
yard, and, unlocking a door, leads us up some narrow 
steps, and lo! we are on the ramparts of the inner walls. 
A little pathway leads entirely round them. Imbedded 
in the walls at one corner are some ancient cannon- 
balls which were fired there in 1554, when Cosimo I. 
sent the Marquis of Marignano to besiege Siena, and 
he made this his head-quarters ; the balls were fired 
by the poor Siennese from their ambush in the pine- 
wood opposite, but they fell harmless, and Siena, de- 
feated at length, succumbed to famine. In the century 
before this, St. Catherine and her nuns retreated here 
here from the joys and the sorrows of the world. 

In the century after the siege, a rich banker named 
Crescenzio Turamini arose in Siena, and determined 
to make the fortress-convent his villa " bello e caro." 
So he sent for Baldassare Peruzzi, the famous painter 
and architect, and bade him renovate the villa, build 
a chapel, and write his name for immortality on the 
walls, in glowing frescoes. Baldassare set to work, 
and his labours still show bello e caro to our eyes. 
The entrance-hall has the "Judgment of Paris," a fine 
fresco, with a Raphaelesque scroll-work around it. . 



272 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

The Loggia is a very Mount Olympus, for all the 
gods and goddesses congregate among the Pompeian 
ornamentation of ceiling and arches. These frescoes 
have been whitewashed over, and again restored, which 
gives them a newness and spic-and-span appearance 
in their white and gold stucco setting, which does not 
add to the classical style. 

The same whitewash-and-stucco effect mars the 
frescoes of the chapel, which the guide assured us 
were the originals of Peruzzi. They are very light 
and delicate, full of pale colouring, especially a light 
green. The subjects are all sacred, but the drawing 
and handling are essentially light and not religious. 
The gods and goddesses are still here, clad in saints' 
garments. There is a charming wreath of cherubim 
in the centre of the roof, but if it were elsewhere 
it would be a perfect group of the Loves. There 
is a St. Joseph, and either an angel or a winged child 
Jesus at his knees, but if it were not in a chapel a 
more charming Eros could not be. To see these 
frescoes after Sodoma's grand religious inspirations, is 
to read Byron after Milton. A quaint Italian garden 
filled with oranges and lemons, roses and masses of 
tall white lilies, is in front of the chapel. The rooms 



THE CASTLE OF BELCARO. 273 

in the villa are restored, like everything else, and well 
restored as far as they go ; the furniture, of splendid 
carved oak on antique models — even the brass keys 
are of mediaeval pattern. The last restorations are 
by a Siennese gentleman, a solitary Croesus who lives 
here alone. 

An amusing little episode occurs on our way home. 
As we pass an old farmhouse, a little '* baghera " with 
a smart donkey is just starting ; in it is a pretty 
laughing girl dressed in blue, with a gipsy hat over 
her smiling face, and a young brother to drive her. 
Waving adieu to her mother, they drive off behind 
us, the boy evidently urging on his donkey by the 
stimulus of emulation with our horses. Merrily they 
jog along behind us with ringing bells ; but, objecting 
to the noise, we beg them to pass. The boy shakes 
his head doubtfully, opining that his animal will not 
go fast enough to lead. They pass, but without emu- 
lation the donkey's spirits flag ; he ceases to trot ; at 
last he wheels round and determinedly takes his way 
home again. We wave our hands to the piquant face, 
no longer smiling, and leave them to fight with the 
donkey for power of will. 



CHAPTER IX. 



®ut H)vipe to IDoIterra anb tbe 
Botay Springs. 




March. 
E were a merry party of six — Mr. and Mrs. 

L , as well as two young friends of 

ours on their way to the South having 
joined us, being anxious to see the Etrus- 
can remains of Volterra. We had taken the evening 
train from Florence, intending to sleep at Poggi- 
bonsi, the nearest post-town to Volterra. For two 
hours we were in exceedingly good spirits, the third 
our laughter became less frequent, another half-hour 
and dead silence fell on us all — even Mr. L 's 



276 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

jokes lost all their spontaneous lightness and fell dead. 
He broke a long silence by inquiring whether " the 
unknown place with the unpronounceable name were 
at the end of the world."- 

** If so," said I, " prepare yourself quickly, for we 
have nearly reached it." 

" P?^dgi-b?^nsi ! P?/dgi-b/^nsi ! " repeated Emily ; 
" what a queer name ! " 

*' Poggi-bonsi," corrected T . "In the Middle 

Ages it was Podmm Bonitii. The mountain behind 
us is still called the * Pogglo-Bonzi.' " 

At that moment the wheels grated on the lines, and 
with an exhausted puff our engine stopped at the 
station of Pogfafi-bonsi. 

Our travellers were well accustomed to the ordinary 
routine of Continental travel, i.e., to a constant change 
from hotel to hotel, one a little more luxurious than 
the other, but this trip into the by-ways was a new 

sensation, and Mr. L got more confirmed than 

ever in his idea that Pudgy-bunsi, as he persisted in 
calling it, was at the end of the world. No omni- 
buses, no cabs, nor even porters at the station ! One 
of the ragged idlers who swarm everywhere in Italy 
was found willing to carry our bags and show us 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 277 

the way to the inn of the "Aquila Nera" (Black 
Eagle). ^ 

"This is a very black eagle indeed!" sighed Mrs. 

L , gathering her skirts about her as we passed 

into a dark stone passage. 

The " Black Eagle " was evidently not civilized, for 
the arrival of six " Inglesi " altogether seemed an 
event of overpowering importance. Landlord, ostler, 
and all the women of the establishment turned out to 
look at us. But the portly host soon sent his woman- 
kind flying for candles, hot water, and sheets, and had 
the field of inspection all to himself. Soon three women 
reappeared, each carrying a tall lucerna — the Tuscan 
substitute for candles — which consists of a tall brass 
lamp with three small burners, and certain arrange- 
ments of snuffers, extinguisher, &c., hung round on 
chains. We followed these dark-eyed lamp-bearers 
(who nearly fell upstairs in their anxiety to look 
behind them at the '' forestieri") into a large room 
with a huge open fireplace that seemed a mediaeval 
remnant of Podium Bonitii. Here the women put 
their lucerne on a table large enough to dine the 
whole Archaeological Society, and then resigned them- 
selves without reserve to the sight before them. 



2/8 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

They deliberately walked round us, examining us 
minutely, remarking that " quella biondci' (the fair 

Mrs. L ) was "■ ta^ito bellinar The soft sealskin 

cloaks attracted great admiration, and they came one 
after another to feel them. By this time the portly 
landlord had arrived upstairs, and again set the 
womankind to work. They first lit a fire of blazing 
faggots in the chimney-corner, which was almost a 
room of itself, and were quite surprised that we pre- 
ferred a fire to the use of scaldini, the Tuscan substi- 
tute for it. As the light fell on the walls we saw they 
were ornamented with very archaic frescoes of Egyp- 
tian landscape : there were small pyramids and 
gigantic sphinxes, with camels as big as the jDalm-trees 
beside them. 

After supper we had an interview with the " Master 
of the Horse," an ex-diligence driver, who, after the 
usual amount of bargaining, promised us a carriage 
and pair, as well as a pony-chaise, to take us to Vol- 
terra and the Lagoni, and to return in three days. 

TuESDAv Morning. 

Oh, miserable awakening ! Rain pelting against 
the window-panes, thick, heavy clouds sitting so close 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 279 

on the mountain-tops that it seemed the chimneys of 
the houses scattered on the hill-sides could almost 
pierce through them. We met in the " Egyptian 
Hall," as we called the archaic dining-room, with long 
faces, but made up our minds that a journey in the 
rain could not be worse than an idle day at Poggi- 
bonsi, and so decided to start in spite of weather. 
Our courage in this respect must, I am sure, have 
greatly confirmed the Italian idea of English eccen- 
tricity. 

Hark ! a trampling of horses' feet and cracking of 
whips. We rush to the window to survey our car- 
riage and pair and pony-chaise, Alas ! the world is 
full of disappointments, and civilization has not 
reached Poggi-bonsi. There stands a carriage which 
must certainly be the first of its species. It is a very 
high, narrow affair, with a hood of a mountainous 
aspect. The " carriage " is of wood, painted bright 
red, very much toned down by the accumulated mud 
of ages. It has hard blue cloth cushions, suggestive 
of " moth and rust." The " pair " are stout horses 
with flowing manes, also flowing fetlocks. They have 
long necks, long heads, and short tails. The want of 
tails of their own is made up by the addition of long 



28o TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

foxes' tails, tied with yellow, dangling from their ears. 
The reins are of red cord, with curious tassels and 
bunches of fringe here and there. But the pony- 
chaise ! It is a calessa of the commonest description — 
a pair of shafts with a wooden seat slung across them. 
A twine net serves to rest the feet, and support any 
bags or parcels placed under the seat. And the pony! 
A poor little mite whose head hangs down and his rat- 
tail stands up, and his bones form a subject for an 
anatomist. 

'' That pony cannot go eighty miles in three days," 
cried Mr. L . 

"If the Signor Inglese will have the goodness to 
try him he will find him perfectly untirable. He 
would do eighty miles in one day if it is needed." 

" Like some of his betters, then, he is not such a 

fool as he looks," laughed Mr. L . " I hope none 

of the Humane Society are within sight, that is all." 
So saying, the two gentlemen having packed the four 
ladies as comfortably as possible into the " carriage," 
proceeded to make martyrs of themselves by braving 
the weather unprotected in the calessa. The general 
inhabitants of Poggi-bonsi looked from their windows 
and wondered ! 



VOLTE RRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 281 

After a drive of half an hour, Mr. L called out 

cheerily, " Fortune favours the brave. I see a bit of 
blue sky." Down went our dripping umbrellas, and 
we feasted our eyes and built our hopes on a tiny 
speck of blue which, alas, soon became clouded again. 
Our courage had not yet won the favour of the fickle 
goddess. The rain left off, but only to change to snow 
as we ascended. 

We rumbled through the endless up-hill street of 
Colle, quite unheeding either the beauties or antiqui- 
ties of this mediaeval city. About a mile beyond it 
the driver declared it impossible to go on, as it was 
three hours' ascent to Volterra, and his horses could 
not possibly do it. On a refusal on our part to go 
back he proposed, to stop an hour at a little roadside 
trattoi'ia ; but the host refused to take us or our 
horses in. "He had no room for either," he said, 
surlily, putting a brigandish-looking head out of the 
window. " Let us try the fattoria or farmhouse," said 
the driver. The farmer and his family were not only 
humane, but Christian kind. Within ten minutes the 
shivering, steaming horses were housed in a good 
shed, and we were all merrily drying our cloaks at the 
cheerful fire of sticks kindled by they^/'/(?r^'i"good wife. 



282 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 



- The kitchen was the strangest room ; the fireplace, 
which was a chimney corner Hke an English cottage- 
hearth, was raised four steps above the rest of the 
room. It was not used for cooking, for the ordinary 
Italian range, with its little charcoal holes, was in the 
kitchen below. The copper cooking utensils shone on 
the walls, the earthernware ones were ranged on the 
shelves, while the ceiling was decorated by rows of 
hams, tongues, pigs' feet, calves' feet, bacon, dried 

tomatoes, &c., as Mr. L graphically said, " like an 

edible stalactite cavern." 

Guests and hosts were a source of mutual amuse- 
ment. The stout fattoressa and her pretty daughters 
confided to us that they had never seen any English 
before, and were struck with surprise that we dressed 
so much like themselves. 

** Why," they said, " your hat, signora, is exactly 
like the new one Assuntina has just had sent her from 
Florence ! " All the time they talked, their respective 
needles and knitting-pins were flying busily. 

" You seem a very industrious family," we said. 

"Yes," smiled the portly mother; "my girls are 
like me, never idle. We are making my second 
daughter's corredo (wedding outfit) now. Assuntina's 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 283 

is done. Go and fetch some of the things, figlie miCy 
and show your work to the signora." We were 
amazed at the numbers of beautiful things. Three 
dozen sets of fine hnen underclothing, forty pairs of 
the finest knitted stockings, knit with clocks, as those 
of our grandmothers were. Fine knitted quilts, ex- 
quisitely embroidered pillow - cases, and even an 
embroidered sheet. 

"And when is the wedding to be?" I asked. 

" Oh, we don't talk of that yet," replied the mother, 
*' Assuntina is only eighteen, and you know we must 
first find the sposo." Imagine the chorus of English 
surprise at seeing a trousseau without a prospect of a 
husband. 

" But don't you find the husband first ? " inquired 
Helen. 

" That would never do ; he would not wait while 
the cor7^edo was being made ; besides we have not 
money enough to put out all at once, and it is more 
convenient to spin a little this year and a little next 
and make up the linen as we weave it." 

** Besides," said the fattore, " a man likes to know 
what he is going to marry." The " what " instead of 
" who " was very significant. 



284 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

" But suppose you do not find a s^oso after all ? " 

" C/ie ! che ! no fear of that. A girl with such a 
corredo and dote, with seven rows of pearls in her 
necklace, is quite safe. My husband has a young 
man in his eye ; he is son of the fattore of the Conte 

D , and has already put away five thousand 

francs in the bank. Our priest will propose her to 
him soon, and then she can be married when she is 
nineteen years old. We are getting on now with Car- 
lotta's cor7^edo. In another year or two, when that is 
done, if we live so long, we shall begin Laurina's," 
concluded the mother, smiling at the little Laurina, 
a child of nine years old. 

" But don't they fall in love first ? " asked Helen, 
who was of a poetical disposition. 

The good wife's face was a sight to see. 

" No, no ! they are brought up too well for that. 
I never trust them alone — never, never ! " she replied, 
smoothing her apron in self-approbation. 

Having thus enlightened our minds as to the Italian 
manners and customs, the good woman required much 
information from us, and on hearing that our English 
youths sought their own wives and fell in love before- 
hand, and that the coi'redo was not commenced till 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 285 

the parents' consent was given to the betrothal, 
they all exclaimed in amazement ; but added, " We 
have always heard the English were a curious people, 
and then — the way you go round about the world 
\_^irare il mondo] in all weathers ! " 

About twelve o'clock it left off snowingf and we 
again started, with many good wishes from our kind 
entertainers. We soon found that the wind was worse 
than the snow, as we ascended the precipitous road 
up, up, up, higher into the icy blasts. The wind 
would come shrieking round the hill, now on this side, 
now on that, blowing clouds of snowdrift in our faces. 
It shook our old chaise till we were in terror of rolling 
over the precipice. No amount of shawls and rugs 
could keep it out from our limbs. Behind us the rat- 
tailed pony put his head nearer than ever to the 
ground, but jogged on in a dogged persistent manner 
that raised our hopes of his capabilities. The two 
gentlemen could scarcely guide him, so benumbed 
were their hands, for on the whole of one side the 
snowdrift had frozen upon them. Added to this were 
the pangs of unappeasable hunger, it being now 
several hours since breakfast. However, after a long 
drive we commenced the ascent of the conical hill on 



TUSCAN SKETCHES. 



which Volterra sits enthroned in her battlemented 
walls, like a giant king reposing with his crown upon 
him. Another hour of winding around the great hill 
and we were safely within those great strong walls, 
and enjoying the fire and our luncheon as we had 
seldom done before. 

After lunch we started to see the antiquities, but 
only got as far as the " Porta dell' Arco," the finest 
Etruscan gateway extant. The inner arch is of huge 
blocks of stone put together without cement ; the 
outer arch — overlooking the immense plain surround- 
ing the hill — is of even larger blocks, uncemented, but 
its charm and mystery is centred in the keystone and 
two pilasters. These blocks project some two feet be- 
yond the others, and the projecting ends are carved in 
the form of gigantic heads, which stretch forth dark and 
mysterious, to look on the scene which has changed under 
their motionless gaze for three thousand years. They 
are blackened by time, the very features undistinguish- 
able, but there is a kind of grandeur in their attitude, a 
noble patience in the outstretched gaze that seems to 
say, " We have conquered Time, and have not bowed 
our heads ; we now await our conqueror, Eternity." 
How wistfully we looked up at those speechless yet 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 287 

eloquent heads ! If they could only tell us of the 
scenes they have beheld ! Of the Etruscans who 
placed them there as guardian deities of their walls ; 
of the fall of that great nation, which as it fell left all 
its story and all its riches buried in its silent tombs. 
They could have told of the legions sent out armed 
against Tarquinius Priscus. They looked on the 
struggle of the Etruscans with Scipio when the two 
powers strove till the darkness ; and also on the entry 
of the Roman troops to occupy its fortress under the 
Triumvirate. They gazed unmoved on the two years' 
siege of Sylla, who at length forced the closed gate- 
way and passed under as conqueror. The great 
Cicero had often passed beneath this Sphinx-guarded 
gateway ; he probably regarded these heads with as 
great a reverence for their antiquity as ourselves. 

We were all struck with silence before these dim, 
dark gazers on the past and the future, impressed as 
we seldom had been in our lives. 

It was too intensely cold to walk round the hill to 
the walls, so we left them till the morrow and went to 
see the alabaster works instead. 

This precious marble abounds at Volterra ; the very 
roads in the poderi are mended with it. Great heaps 



288 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

of cuttings from the works are thrown out here and 
there, but the manufactories are not so artistic as we 
imagined. We saw numbers of workmen engaged in 
sculpture by rule and compass, and then were shown 
the finished pieces ; but it is evident that art gives 
way to commerce. We saw rooms full of vases, all of 
one form, tables full of dogs with baskets in their 
mouths, of vine-leaved candlesticks, of children emerg- 
ing from embroidered slippers, but nothing more than 
mere mechanical repetitions. 

** Ora, ora ! " said the man to whom we expressed 
disappointment. " Now I will show you cose d' arte.''' 

So we went to another room or suite of rooms. It 
was truly full of beauties, but too full. Even the 
Venus de' Medici seems to lose her beauty side by 
side with a whole row of identical Venuses. The 
dancing Graces are multiplied so often as to outnum- 
ber the Muses. Canova's Hebe shows her well- 
dressed head in all sizes and marked at all prices. 
Such a multiplication of gems that ought to be unique 
worried us, and with a purchase or two we took our 
leave. We shall perhaps like our statuettes better 
when they shine alone in our English drawing- 
rooms. 



VOLTE ERA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 289 

Wednesday, March 15. 

Our courageous battle against the elements yester- 
day has won the favour of Fortune, who has given us 
a cloudless day for our long drive to the Borax 

Springs. We started at nine o'clock, T and myself 

going, like Darby and Joan, in the "market cart." 
But, alas ! we soon found that driving in a Tuscan 
calesse was not the most pleasant mode of locomotion : 
it had no springs, and cross-country roads are rough. 
The descent from Volterra is a winding or rather zig- 
zag road, from which you get all kinds of varied views 
of the noble town with its great battlemented walls 
and castellated towers settled firmly on its moun- 
tainous height. The surrounding country is bare and 
brown, as withered and wrinkled as a rhinoceros-hide. 
No vegetation, no life of any kind ; only hillocks and 
ridges of brown clay running into and over one 
another, and leaving weird-looking, stagnant pools in 
the crevices. One would almost fancy those mys- 
terious heads gazing out from the Porta dell' Arco to 
be basilisks, whose fixed gaze had withered up the 
land they overlooked. 

At " Le Moje," six miles distant from Volterra, we 
stopped to see the Saline or Salt Works of San 

19 



290 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

Leopoldo, where the Government have found it so 
profitable to " earn their salt," that they have made a 
monopoly of it, and thereby put an annual ;^ 130,000 
into their revenues. Nature delights in variety ; 
every country seems to find its salt in a different 
manner. The English draw it from the sea, the Poles 
dig it solid from the ground, and the Tuscans have it 
flowing in liquid springs. 

At Le Moje are eight springs, issuing from wells 
bored to the depth of one hundred feet. Wooden 
aqueducts bring the water from these wells to the 
works — a distance of two or three miles : here it 
flows into several large iron evaporating pans, heated 
from beneath by huge furnaces, in which we saw large 
trunks of trees blazing. By long boiling a thick 
deposit of salt is formed, which is every six hours 
scraped up to drying-ledges on the sides of the boiler, 
and from thence carried away to the stores. 

The stores were quite picturesque — a miniature 
Alps formed of irregular piles of snowy, glistening salt. 
These works produce twenty-two millions of Tuscan 
pounds of salt annually. It is of a clear, large crystal, 
very white and pure, though not fine like the table 
salt used in England. 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 291 

On leaving here we drove through Pomerance, a 
large town which looked very imposing from a dis- 
tance, but in all the length of its streets we could not 
see any inn decent enough to ask for the luncheon we 
needed, so we stayed our hunger with a dry brown 
loaf of the peculiarly sour, leavened bread of the 
country, and a flask of wine not to be classed with the 
" luscious Tuscan wines " of which poets have many 
praises. 

We could see the distant clouds of steam ascending 
from the Borax Springs of " Larderello," and fondly 
deemed that, as we could behold the limit of our 
journey, the end was near. Alas, for vain hopes ! we 
drove on and on, round endless mountain ridges, and 
as we passed one, another came between us and the 
ever distant clouds of steam. 

At length, after skirting fertile valleys and going 
round projecting mountains for six miles, we crossed 
the dashing torrent of Possera by a splendidly built 
bridge of one arch, seventy-two feet wide and ninety 
above the river, and felt like Dante when he descended 
into Inferno. Of all places I have seen this is by far 
the most wonderful. 

The whole valley is occupied by Nature's boiling 



292 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

caldrons. Steam and sulphur fill the air. During 
half an hour we lived on a minimum amount of air, 
and that inhaled through cambric pocket-handkerchiefs. 

In the absence of the proprietor, Count Larderel, to 
whom our letter was addressed, the priest kindly went 
round with us, and after thoroughly frightening, suc- 
ceeded in just as thoroughly interesting us. 

We started on our tour of inspection like so many 
mutes at a funeral, with our faces tied in our handker- 
chiefs, each one of us declaring that we could not live 
ten minutes in such an atmosphere of sulphurous 
steam ; but at the end of that time we found it much 
more bearable, and when half an hour was over we 
forgot the vapours altogether. One of our party 
having strayed a few steps, the priest calling her back, 
warned us solemnly to keep close to him, for he said 
the ground was so treacherous that a false step would 
plunge us into a boiling watery grave. After that we 
followed him like a flock of sheep, as may be imagined. 

The boracic acid lagoni lie in a valley near Monte 
Cerboli, and extend over a square mile of the rugged 
ground. The lagoons are several in number — some 
are mere ponds, others large reservoirs, but each of 
them is like a liquid Vesuvius, having an eruption of 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 293 

boiling water in its midst, which is so fierce as to throw 
up the jet of water with mud and even stones, and a 
volume of blinding steam, ten or twelve feet above the 
level of the lagoon. The springs are sixty feet below 
the ground : such a force seems quite inconceivable. 
This sulphurous vapour contains the boracic acid, and 
is made to pass through the water of the lagoons long 
enough to impregnate it thoroughly, when it is con- 
veyed in conduits to purifying reservoirs, where it 
evaporates by natural heat, and then is put into large 
butts to crystallize. This crystallization is the boracic 
acid as it is sent to England ; ^240 worth of it is 
produced daily. To us the awe of the place was nearly 
as great as its interest. We walked on plank bridges 
across the steaming lagoons, enveloped in such dense 
vapour that we could only see a step before us on the 
plank. 

" Suppose we fell in, what would become of us ? " 
asked Mr. L . 

" You would be skinned like an eel before being 
cooked," said the priest, in grim jest. 

"If any one wants to write a second ' Inferno,' in 
emulation of Dante," said Mr. L , " here is inspira- 
tion for him. It might be founded on fact." 



294 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

The good priest, having shown us all the works, 
next took us into the village, which is in the midst of 
the vapour. There are several rows of neat cottages, 
like English labourers' model houses. The streets 
and terraces are named after the sons of Count Lar- 
derel. Then there is the Larderel mansion, very 
large, and built squarely of red bricks : the priest's and 
manager's houses, and then a row of buildings in which 
we soon found the priest's heart was bound up. 

When we saw them we envied him his happy pride 
in his labours. Here were the schools — the infants', 
the boys', the girls', and the adults' night-school — all 
in such exquisite order and keeping that they would 
win a premium from an English school board. Then 
came a spinning and weaving school for the young 
unmarried women. The philanthropic Count Larderel 
supplies the wool and cotton, and the stuffs are sold 
for the profit of the makers. We watched several 
pretty-looking girls at their looms making linen, cloth, 
and bordato, a strong plaid linen used by the Tuscan 
contadini, or peasants. 

Next was a good large music-hall, in which the 
^^illage concerts and music classes are held. The 
Count has given all the music and the instruments, 



VOLTE RRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 295 

and provides a good master, who comes out from 
Florence once a week. The band is well organized, 
and plays very pleasingly. We heard a solo on the 
cornet by a boy of fifteen, whose proficiency quite 
astonished us. 

The church has a very pretty interior, with several 
good works of art in it. Near the church is the 
library, museum of geological specimens, and the 
pharmacy, from which all the work-people and their 
families have medicine gratis. 

"This is a very liberal institution," remarked T . 

*' I should imagine it is much needed, however, in this 
unhealthy atmosphere." 

"On the contrary," laughed the priest, "if the 
chemist depended on his business he would certainly 
fail. The atmosphere is unusually healthy ; we have 
very little sickness indeed. Why, look at me — I have 
lived twenty years here ! " And he tapped his broad 
chest till it echoed again. Certainly he was in excel- 
lent health and condition. 

" Count Larderel has provided well for his people 
in mind, body, and soul," we said, as we took leave of 
our courteous guide, and returned to the inn, where 
we managed to eat a hearty lunch in spite of the 



296 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

sulphur vapours. At five we started on our return, 
and reached Volterra at nine, after a most exquisite 
drive. 

The reflections of a rosy sunset sky and a clear 
rising moon strove for supremacy in the waters of the 
Etruscan stream, the Cecina, as we drove over the fine 
suspension bridge. How clearly the crowned head of 
the giant hill of Volterra stood out in the full moon- 
beams ; how majestic were the huge battlemented 
walls and arched gateways in the silver light ; how we 
sang Mendelssohn's open-air music till our voices 
tired ; how we enjoyed our very late dinner, and how 

sleepy we all were ! — Mr. L too tired even to 

make a joke. 

Thursday, March 16. 

We gave next morning to Volterra, and a long and 
well-employed morning we had, in learning the useful 
lesson not to judge too hastily from first impressions. 
On entering the cathedral our impressions were, "What 
a splendid interior, what a wealth of antique marble 
columns ! " Alas ! the columns were not even scagliola, 
but barefaced plaster and stucco, peeling off here and 
there. The only really good work of art, beyond some 
pictures in the sacristy, was some beautiful marble sculp- 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 297 

ture of Mino da Fiesole, which having been turned 
upside down for a century or so to make paving-stones, 
was now being restored to the hght of day as an altar- 
piece. Next at the Museum the general exclamation 
on entering was a shuddering " Oh ! oh ! what a dismal 
collection of tombs ! Is there nothing to see but old 
tombs ? " and the universal feeling on leaving at the 
end of an hour or two, was that of intense interest, as 
if we had been reading a sweet old story. There were 
several rooms all filled with Etruscan ash chests, each 
with the effigy of its former tenant reclining on the 
lid ; some of these figures so lifelike that one could 
almost imagine them the dead of centuries returned 
to tell their tale. I suppose no nation ever made the 
silent tomb so eloquent as the Etruscans ; their idea of 
death must have been much more that of a second life, 
than the utter annihilation, which seems to have been 
the general idea of the ancients. When life died 
out they embalmed its story, and laid it up in the 
sealed tomb, and we can read it after three thousand 
years. In Volterra the fashion of burning the dead 
must have prevailed, for the tombs, with one or two 
exceptions, are mere alabaster or travertine boxes to 
contain the ashes. The sides of these urns are adorned 



298 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

with bas-reliefs of classical or mythological subjects, 
and the lids, with the sculptured effigies on them, form 
perfect portraits of the deceased. The adjuncts of 

these were full of meaning, and T interested 

us very much by interpreting all the poetical 
emblems, till we could make up our own stories of the 
long-past lives. The pretty young girl with braided 
hair, and a half-opened flower in her hand, had died 
young and unmarried. The handsome woman, who 
held a pomegranate (emblem of fruitfulness) in her 
marble hand, had with that hand in life caressed and 
nursed her children, had with those fixed eyes laughed 
at their joys, and wept at their little sorrows. The 
lady with the fan and mirror had been perhaps a 
leader of society, and who knows what lost learning 
filled the brain of the woman with the Greek profile 
who held her writing tablets in her hand ? The 
husbands and fathers of these fair ones showed that 
the banquet was to them the enjoyment of life, for 
here is the ** ruling passion strong in death." Nearly 
all have a Bacchic chaplet on their flowing locks, 
and hold either a patera or drinking vase in their 
hands. 

The bas-reliefs are as eloquent as the effigies, and 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 299 

invest death with a depth of poetical meaning that 
divests it of half its terrors. On one Aurora is rising 
from the waves, as the soul springs from the dark flood 
of death, and rises to heaven in the full light of day. 
On another Pluto is carrying off Proserpine to Hades, 
a huge Fury lashing the steeds to swiftness — a 
touching story of a sudden and unprepared for death. 
The subject of Jason and Cadmus sowing the dragon's 
teeth, and reaping the fruits in an army of armed men, 
is often repeated, and to me it seemed only an illustra- 
tion of many lessons in the Bible ; it was indeed 
" sowing the wind and reaping the whirlwind." 
Another oft-repeated one is Ulysses and the Syrens. 
The steadfast soul, armed against all temptations, 
guides his bark steadily towards the haven of safety. 
But not all are from the Greek mythology; some have 
purely Etruscan designs, such as the marine deities, 
who, with human bodies, have double fishes' tails, and 
two serpents writhing round their heads. These ter- 
rible creatures are the grim spouses Glaucus and 
Scylla. Then come Echidna and Typhon, the two 
snaky Furies, who are the progenitors of all that is 
evil. Then the Hippocampus or sea-horse, the Etrus- 
can rendering of Neptune's steeds ; also Griffons and 



300 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

" Chimeras " of impossible forms. The horrible pre- 
dominates as strongly in Etruscan mythology as the 
poetical in Greek. 

Another more interesting group of tombs are 
those whose reliefs illustrate Etruscan life, or fune- 
real manners and customs. Here are boar hunts, 
circus games, either bull fights, gladiator combats, 
or horse racing, which the Romans are supposed 
to have adopted from Etruria when Tarquin became 
king of Rome. Some urns are adorned with sculp- 
tures of processions, and other pageantry, there are 
warriors' triumphs and funeral corteges, also grand 
pageants of judges going to their judgment-seats, with 
all the concomitants of lictors and fasces, of slaves 
bearing cw^tde chairs, tablets, document cases, &c. 
One had a touching group of a veiled woman and two 
children stopping the judges in the way to implore 
mercy for the criminal husband. In the funereal 
scenes the mortal and spiritual world are always blended. 
The soul who is departing for the other world, whether 
he takes the journey on foot, on horseback, or in a 
closed litter, is attended by good and evil genii, who 
often seem struggling for possession of him even as he 
crosses the dark river. Some prefer to give the last 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 301 

moments of life rather than the first ones of eternity, 
and these are peculiarly touching. 

" One touch of nature makes the whole world kin." 

And as we look we feel a strong sympathy for the 
weeping wife clinging in a last embrace to her dying 
husband, and a longing to console those tiny children 
crying terror-stricken round his couch. Their sorrows 
are over three thousand years ago, but they live still 
in the lives of us, their younger sisters. 

On some tombs sacrifices are being offered, either 
animal or the more horrid human ones. Here is even 
an altar with a cross on it — a strange foreshadowing 
of Christianity. 

The Etruscans were highly civilized and very 
luxurious — the banqueting scenes show this : the 
tables are furnished so elegantly ; the banqueters, 
male and female, so richly adorned ; slaves regale 
them with music and food at the same time. Some 
banquets are merely domestic meals, with children 
playing around and tame birds beneath the table. 
One tomb shows a school, with a number of little 
girls reading from scrolls. 

Thus do the tombs of Etruria speak more of life 



TUSCAN SKETCHES. 



than of death, and thus do the silent dead tell the lost 
story of a great people. In many of the names we 
see the forefathers of the great Roman families — the 
Flavii, the Gracchi, and the Csecina, whose name is 
still brought down to us in the river Cecina, which 
flows by Volterra. There are but few vases in the 
Museum, and these mostly of the time of the fall of 
art, for they are coarse and ugly. The real black 
polished Volterra ware is very beautiful. The bronzes 
are only a very small and poor collection compared to 
the beautiful one in Florence ; the jewellery also is 
neither very fine nor abundant, but the glass vases, 
lachrymatories, paterse, &c., are exquisite and rare. 

Having thus seen all the produce of the tombs, the 
next thing was obviously to go into one ; but, alas ! 
for disappointments ! A tiresome walk down a steep, 
rugged hill ; a long search for a custode, who was 
slow of coming ; and then we went underground. 
Clambering down a roughly-dug hole we entered a 
circular cave, with a column in the centre, the hole so 
small that we had to creep into it backward, and so 
strewn with broken tombs that we could scarcely move 
a step. Thence another long walk up and round the 
hills skirting the town on the north brought us to the 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 303 

Baize, a ravine with wonderfully grand and picturesque 
precipices several hundred feet deep. There is an 
element of awe in the place, for the rocks are still 
crumbling : we heard pieces rolling down and rebound- 
ing like cannon-shot. We were told that one church 
(San Giusto) had been already engulfed in the chasm, 
and that the church and monastery of San Salvadore 
stand in danger of falling soon. 

We had not time to go into the monastery, as we 
were anxious to see the accessible portions of the 
Etruscan walls, of which we had traced several re- 
mains in the distant pode7% or olive fields, as we 
skirted the northern hill to the Baize. The portions 
of wall between the Baize and Porta San Francesco 
are very fine ; they are of large rectangular masses, 
like the better known ones of Fiesole, and the Cyclo- 
pean blocks, overgrown with verdure, are often very 
picturesque. 

Having made the tour of the Etruscan walls, we 
entered the grand old Etruscan gateway, Porta dell' 
Arco, with a feeling that the mysterious heads out- 
stretched from its arch frowned at us for finding in- 
terest in the fallen grandeur of the city they had seen 
in its living power and splendour. 



304 , TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

After dinner a hasty visit to the alabaster works to 
buy some vases and statuettes ; then back to the 
hotel, where our primitive equipages awaited us. 

" Pudgy-bunsy " had his head lower than usual at 
the prospect of another long pull. Mr. and Mrs. 

L , who had taken a fancy to the little calesse (or 

market cart), drove away. We all mounted the red 

carriage, awaiting T , who had dropped behind at 

the alabaster works. The assembled population of 
Volterra crowded the Piazza to see the forestie^d 
depart, and we found their gaze so embarrassing 
that we alighted again and went into the hotel. 
Half an hour passed before the truant joined us 
with his prize, a pair of beautifully-wrought gold 
Etruscan earrings, which he had bought of a Volterran 
antiquary. Besides their value as a work of art, they 
were peculiarly interesting as a proof that the Etrus- 
cans in this city burned their dead, for both earrings 
were partially melted and destroyed by heat. 

Some mile or two from Volterra we descried 

" Pudgy-bunsy " — as Mr. L had sarcastically 

named the pony ! His bones were very visible, his 
pace that of a snail, and his head seemed trying to 
whisper to his tired feet. 



VOLTERRA AND THE BORAX SPRINGS. 305 

" How are we to do twenty miles with this wretched. 

beast ? " cried Mr. L . " He won't move a step 

without the whip, and I can't use that on such a 
creature." 

Our portly driver laughed. " He wants com- 
panions, signor, that is all ; if you let me lead the 
way he'll follow." So we passed in front, our horses' 
bells ringing merrily as we trotted down the long 
descent. Wonder of wonders ! Up went Pudgy- 
bunsy's head, his ears pricking in the most lively way ; 
his crawl became a trot, the trot merged into a canter, 
and the calesse rattled behind us all the way in the 
cold evening air. The mediaeval town of Colle looked 
lovely with the pure moonlight pencilling out its gates, 
its turretted walls, and old castles. 

We reached Pogglbonsi at half-past eight, and 
found that "mine host" had prepared a supper which 
he thought worthy even of English appetites — he had 
even over-estimated them. 



20 



CHAPTER X. 



H Sbiine of mebiseval Hrt. 




UR friends decide that they have had 
sufficient experience of country driving in 
Italy, and so they will take the train to 
Florence, instead of accompanying us on 
our pilgrimage to San Gimignano. 

" I bid adieu to * Pudgy-bunsy ' with regret," 

laughed Mr. L ; " but I look forward to a return 

to civilization as necessary to comfort." 

"If there were a decent tramway to San Gimignano 
now ! " adds his wife. 

" There is not even a vetturino," said T ; " to 



A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART. 307 

reach it one must plunge entirely into the byways, 
and not only go out of the known world but out of the 
nineteenth century, for there you will find yourself in 
the Middle Ages." 

" And have the uncomfortable feeling of being an 
anachronism. Thank you, I will go back to Florence 

and her hotels," decides Mr. L ; and as soon as 

we have seen them depart by rail, we turn our atten- 
tion to the choice of a vehicle to take us to San 
Gimignano. 

There are plenty of vehicles to choose from, but all 
seem in an equal state of dinginess, dustiness, and a 
general shaky condition as regards wheels and 
springs. Confiding ourselves to one of these calesse, 
we start on a long drive across the pretty country of 
the Val d' Elsa, where are olives, corn, and vines in 
abundance, with here and there a little wood struggling 
up the rugged sides of a chasm in the reddish sand- 
stone. From afar off we see San Gimignano, and so 
tall and numerous are its towers that it looks as if the 
child of a giant had been playing with its bricks and 
stuck all the longest ones on end in a cluster. Of 
course when we seem within half a mile of the town 
we have the usual detour of three miles, which is 



A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART. 309 

necessary to scale the heights to any old Italian city. 
We lose sight of it twice, and just at the moment 
when we think it must be a myth altogether we come 
suddenly on it — a cluster of gigantic square towers 
rising up golden bright against a black mass of clouds. 
Round piles of machicolated masonry, forming the 
entrance to the town, stand beneath these towers. 
The whole scene is like a mysterious aerial fortress 
uplifted against the wild sky, for surrounding us, and 
seeming miles below, the green valley is spread out, 
melting by delicate gradations into blue as it reaches 
the distant mountains, while the setting sun in streams 
of gold, lights up the frowning old towers and gates, 
bringing them out in full relief on the black sky 
behind. 

Within the gate, we drive noisily over the multiform 
paving-stones, through tortuous streets filled with Gothic 
houses, propped up against each other by arches and 
flying buttresses high in air. Arriving at the foot of 
a street steeper than the others, the calesse draws up, 
and the driver begs us to alight as the vehicle can go 
no further. The doors of all the Gothic houses are 
filled with interested spectators of our arrival, many 
hands are extended to take possession of our bags, 



3IO TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

and with a strong escort we climb the hilly street 
which brings us to a curious double piazza, on the 
first part of which are an ancient fountain and the 
palace of the Podesta, and on the second our inn and 
the Duomo. So quaint and redolent of mediaeval 
times does everything seem, that it is with a start we 
find that echoes from the world have reached here, 
and the two piazze are called " Victor Emanuele " 
and " Cavour." 

Seeing our belongings disappear within an arch- 
way darker than the others we follow them, and find 
ourselves in the "Albergo delle due Piazze;" the 
salle a manger of which is furnished with two wooden 
tables, dark with age, and some solid chairs. A chest 
of drawers does duty as sideboard, and a long, rough 
shelf on the wall as a wine depot. Civility and a 
hearty welcome, however, atone for lack of luxuries, 
and hunger and fatigue sweeten the plainest fare. 

The bright sun shows us the quaint piazza next 
morning, and we feel, not like Rip Van Winkle, that 
we have awaked a century too late, but that we have 
retrograded two or three hundred years. There are 
four square towers rising up into the blue air above 
the old-fashioned houses ; two others on our side of 



A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART. 311 

the piazza fling their shadows across its space. On 
the right is the ancient Palazzo dell' Oriolo, whose 
clock face has mediaeval figures and only one hand, 
whose lamps, balustrades, and torch-rings are in 
fine old wrought iron. The entrance to this is a 
cavernous archway, furnished all round with stone 
seats, which seems to be a useful resort for itinerant 
vendors. A primitive fishmonger occupies the front 
of it to-day ; in lieu of marble bench he has a wide 
tub half filled with water, in which we see a mass of 
shining fishes in constant motion. I do not know 
whether the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to 
Animals extends its protection to fish, but surely 
they need it sorely when treated as these are. 
A woman comes to buy, and a bunch of fishes are 
taken out all ready strung on a reed, but still alive ; 
they wriggle even as she carries them away, to the 
great delight of an urchin of five years old, who 
follows his mother, giving the creatures a poke every 
now and then. A brisk sale ensues ; the hostess of 
our inn goes out to buy some, by which we get a 
foreknowledge of our dinner. 

The opposite side of the piazza is occupied by the 
Collegiate Church, a large building with a wide flight 



312 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

of Steps reaching all across the square. The facade 
only reaches to the top of the doorways, all the 
upper part being unfinished. On going out after 
breakfast we first turned our steps to this church. 
What a mass of colour greeted us ! This was how 
the churches looked in ancient times ! Not an inch 
uncolour'ed. A Bible in fresco spread in pictures 
on the walls ; roof diapered in colour all over, the 
beams and spans of the arches arabesqued, cornices, 
lunettes, rood loft — every part glowing with varied 
tints like a Moorish mosque. Most of the older 
frescoes have been badly restored, but the general 
effect at first sight is very impressive. The left wall 
has a series of subjects from the Old Testament, by 
Bartolo di Fredi (1356), the father of Taddeo Bartolo 
of Siena. The drawing is stiff, but the motives full 
of imagination ; the figures are relieved on a black 
background, but no true judgment can be made of 
the colouring, they having been badly restored about 
a hundred and fifty years ago. 

On the right wall, Berna of Siena (1380) has done 
a series of scenes from the New Testament. There 
is all the serious intensity of his school, with the 
struggling after the expression of truth which so often 



A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART. 313 

goes with the imperfect execution of his time. The 
subjects are in two rows of compartments except in 
the last, the "Crucifixion," which takes the whole 
height of the wall. It is a great weird picture, fly- 
ing angels and demons, fill the black background,, 
spectral horses of a gigantic size loom here and there 
like colossal ghosts ; the foreground is occupied by 
groups of figures full of intense life and expression. 
These paintings cost the artist his life, for stepping 
back too far on his scaffolding to see the effect of 
his work, he fell, and was so much injured that he died 
two days afterwards. The people of San GimignanO' 
gave him a pompous interment in the church, and 
paid such respect to his genius that his tomb was 
constantly covered with Latin elegies, or sonnets and 
verses in his honour. His pupil, Giovanni d'Ascanio, 
finished the frescoes. 

It was nearly ninety years after this when BenozzO' 
Gozzoli added his martyrdom of St. Sebastian, which is 
between the entrance doors. The composition is fine,, 
but the chief figure is wanting in life. Art had not 
yet reached the power of delineating from the nude. 
These early works of Gozzoli's may, however, be 
looked on as almost the birth of landscape painting. 



314 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

There is a great feeling for nature in the forms of 
the hills and undulations of the landscape, in the 
little plants springing from the crevices of the rocks, 
and the flowers beneath the feet of the saint, although 
the greens are crude and the aerial perspective not 
good. But the gem of the church is the chapel 
of Santa Fina, near the right transept, which is 
decorated by some of Domenico Ghirlandajo's finest 
frescoes. S. Gimignano is more rich in local saints 
than most towns ; for besides the bishop from whom it 
took its name, and who is said to have liberated the 
city from the power of Attila, it boasts two mediaeval 
saints, Sta. Fina and S. Bartolo, both being instances 
of the peculiar bias of the times to look on suffering 
as sanctity. Sta. Fina was born in 1238 of noble 
lineage, but her parents had fallen into extreme 
poverty. She showed signs of especial purity from 
her earliest years, and being left an orphan, endowed 
with great beauty, in a crowded city and lawless times, 
she was so alarmed by an offer of marriage from a 
youth, that she prayed God to send her some chas- 
tisement which would save her from all such tempta- 
tions to draw her heart away from Christ in the future. 
This prayer, of which we should doubt the piety in our 



A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART. 315 

days, was answered. Fina was struck with a painful 
spinal disease, which she accepted as a sign of God's 
favour, and, renouncing the luxury of a bed, spent the 
the remainder of her life stretched on a hard board. 

In her chapel, which Ghirlandajo was called from 
Florence to paint (in company with his pupil 
Sebastiano Mainardi, who was a native of S. 
Gimignano), the artist has given two scenes of the 
saint, in her life and in her death. 

The first gives the interior of her cottage with its 
mediaeval furniture of massive oak, the plates of old 
majolica on the shelf, and a bit of distant landscape 
seen through the small deep window. Fina lies 
patiently on her board, while her nurse Beldia sits 
sorrowful beside her. She has on her head the 
quaint wimple worn at that time, and of which the 
tradition is still preserved in the close white veils 
of the nuns. There are few soft lines in the com- 
position except in the fall of this wimple and the 
slight undulations of the girlish form of the saint. It 
bears the impress of the hand of Ghirlandajo, which 
was more accustomed to the hardness of metal than the 
soft gradations of colour. There is clear, stern, hard 
relief, but a good full harmony of colour. 



3i6 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

In the " Death of Sta. Fina," on the opposite wall, the 
master is at his very best. The composition is very 
similar to the " Death of St. Francis," painted a few 
years later for the Sassetti chapel in Santa Trinita, 
Florence — the bier of the saint in the midst surrounded 
by a semicircle of spectators, the background the 
rounded apse of a church. In the death of St. Francis 
the bystanders are monks, mourning their lost com- 
panion. In that of Sta. Fina her nurse kneels beside 
her, imploring a sign of recognition even from the 
grave, and the dead girl miraculously lifts her hand. 
Around the bier stands a group of priests, citizens, 
and little chorister boys, one of whom kneels in 
adoration to kiss the feet of the sainted maiden. 

Ghirlandajo's style of drawing and sculpturesque 
folds of drapery fit well with the subject, giving it 
that decorous gravity which entirely suits it. His por- 
traiture is also most valuable : the faces of the men 
of the time are stamped indelibly on the walls, the 
grave, quaint setting of the mediaeval features, the 
naive devotional expression of the innocent boys, the 
lines of thought and care on the wrinkled features of 
the elder men wrapped each in the stately folds of his 
lucco, are all wonderfully lifelike; the colouring is 



A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART. 317 

full and rich, and the relief marvellous. The roof 
of the chapel (the Evangelists, Saints, and Prophets) 
is the work of Sebastiano Mainardi, Ghirlandajo's 
favourite scholar, who, being a San Gimignanese, had 
no doubt obtained this commission for his master. 
He made lasting friendships in the city, for his second 
wife was a widow named Antonia, of San Gimignano, 
and Mainardi cemented his ties to his master by 
marrying Ghirlandajo's young sister. 

The marble altar is a beautiful work by Benedetto 
da Majano. The youthful saint is very miraculous, 
and her chapel is covered with votive offerings, many 
of them extremely curious. There are certain long 
rows of little kneeling figures of a most archaic form 
repousse in tin, and some dreadful paintings of illnesses 
and accidents, some of them dating from 1524, 1526, 
&c. There is a great wealth of silver still about 
the chapel, but the sacristan told us that it had been 
robbed about a year or two ago, and several thousand 
pounds' worth of silver and jewels taken. 

In the choir are a few good old paintings, the most 
interesting being Benozzo Gozzoli's ** Virgin and 
Child," with saints kneeling in front ; a group of 
•angels hold a crown and wreaths of flowers about her 



3i8 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

head. In this we seem to see the prototype of many 
more familiar paintings by the later hands of Fra 
Bartolommeo, Perugino, and Raphael. Pollajuolo's 
" Coronation of the Virgin " is an important picture, 
showing the intense power of expression which 
struggled against conventional handling in the school 
of the goldsmith painters. Of Mainardi, few inde- 
pendent works exist beyond the walls of his native 
city. His masterpiece is between the windows in the 
choir. It is a Madonna, with S. Gimignano, Fina, 
and other saints. Ghirlandajo's style is to be traced, 
but with all its faults, and less than its excellencies. 
In the sacristy, a very venerable relic was shown 
us, the finger of S. Gimignano himself. His body re- 
poses at Modena. We also saw the dress of Santa 
Fina, which, in spite of her poverty, was of good 
brocade. 

The Palazzo Pubblico stands on the side of the 
piazza at right-angles with the church. It is a 
mediaeval castellated building of the style of the 
Palazzo Vecchio at Florence, but less rich in archi- 
tecture ; its most peculiar feature is that the tallest 
tower in the city rises over an arch across the street 
beside it. When the Republic was established, it 



A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART. 319 

was found inconvenient that the civil rulers could 
not make use of the bells of the Colleofiate Church 
without express permission of the clergy ; so the Com- 
mune determined to build a bell-tower for its own 
use, and having no ground available, flung its founda- 
tions across the street on an archway. A tax of three 
hundred lire was made on the entering office of 
each podesta who wished the privilege of affixing 
his arms on the facade of the palace, and in 130Q 
the tower was commenced. Its bell which can be 
heard six miles away, weighs 12,000 Tuscan pounds. 

The Palazzo Pubblico is, like the church, covered 
with frescoes. Go where you will, frescoes meet your 
eye. Beneath the arches of the loggia, on the pillars, 
up the stairs, in the rooms — some appearing dimly 
beneath coats of whitewash, some peering forth in 
fragments where stucco has been knocked off"; a few 
badly restored, and fewer still entire. Of the latter 
the gem is Lippo Memmi's large fresco in the Sala di 
Consiglio, where it fills almost one entire wall. 

The composition is evidently taken from the great 
fresco of his cousin, Simone, on the wall of the Public 
Palace at Siena, done two years before — 1375, and in 
which Lippo assisted him. The Virgin and Child are 



320 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

enthroned in the midst under a canopy ; crowds of 
saints stretch out on each side of her, all more or less 
conventional. In the midst kneels a little figure of 
Nello Tolomei, the podesta of the time, dressed in a 
gorgeous lucco of red and black stripes. 

There is a great striving after expression, and much 
of the style of Simone Memmi, but the Byzantine 
traditions are still strong; the conventional attitudes, 
immobile limbs, gold glories, and straight folds, are 
the bonds which imprison Memmi's art. Benozzo 
Gozzoli restored the fresco in 1467, but his restorations 
seem now little less old than the original. 

Historically, this Council Hall is extremely interest- 
ing. In it the Commune of San Gimignano received 
Dante, when he was sent as ambassador to propose to 
the city that it should join the Florentine League — a 
proposition the Republic was only too glad to accept, 
being tired of the internal dissensions between the 
rival parties of the Ardinghelli and Salucci, whose 
hostile towers rise near each other around the piazza. 
Dante also rendered here the acknowledgments of the 
Florentines for the assistance of San Gimignano in 
vanquishing the Ghibellines at Campaldino. 

Opening from the Council Hall is a balcony, from 



A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART. 321 

which it was said Dante showed himself and addressed 
the excited crowd below. We stood some time on this 
balcony gazing on the quaint piazza, so unchanged in 
many centuries. Just as we see it now it must have 
looked when Pope Eugene III. was carried up those 
wide steps into the church when he came to consecrate 
it, and give it the rank of Cathedral, in 1148. What 
a picturesque crowd must have filled the square ! the 
long procession in which the Benedictine monks led 
the way, and the Augustlnes followed ; then a train of 
nuns brought forth from their seclusion for this one 
exciting day ; next the new-elected prebends, canons, 
and priests ; then the Pope, under his uplifted canopy, 
a file of cardinals on each side, gleaming in the sun like 
scarlet popples in a cornfield. 

The armed procession of knights and burghers who 
attended Dante when he came in his diplomatic state 
nearly two hundred years later was of a very 
different kind from this. A surging crowd filled 
the piazza while he was received in audience in 
the Council Hall, — the rival parties of Ardinghelli 
and Salucci awaiting the decision of the Commune 
in armed truce, their smouldering enmities ready to 
break into flame on the smallest provocation. 

21 



322 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

Again two hundred years had passed when, in 1484, 
the piazza was the scene of intense excitement, of a 
nature quite different. On the steps of the church 
stood a man in the dress of a monk ; his earnest eyes 
blazed like fires beneath the heavy overhanging lids, 
his nostrils dilated with emotion, his large mobile 
mouth poured forth inspired words that kindled the souls 
of all the vast multitude. None had ever seen such 
emotion, or heard such words before, although they 
were to stir the soul of Italy to its depths ; for it was at 
San Gimignano that the spirit of prophecy first fell on 
Savonarola. The people who stood on this balcony, 
who peered from the windows of the quaint houses, 
and who filled the piazza with awe-struck faces, were 
the very first to hear these words : " The Church will 
be scourged, and then regenerated, and the scourging 
shall come quickly." 

When we had completed our explorations of the ancient 
Communal Palace, with its fading frescoes, its multitu- 
dinous rooms with groined roofs and deep embrasured 
windows, we wandered about the curious old town, 
where we discovered several Gothic houses amongst 
the prison-like mediaeval ones. An old square machi- 
colated building, with Lombard windows, had an 



A SHRINE OF MEDLEVAL ART. 323 

inscription over the door that it was erected by 
Desiderius, the last king- of the Longobards : but it 
appears that the connection of Desiderius with San 
Gimignano is very doubtful, if not as mythic as the 
story that Attila was turned away by the prayers of 
the bishop San Gimignano, who went in procession 
down the hill to meet the destroyer and beseech him 
to pass by the city in peace. 

Quite at the extreme end of the town is the church 
of St. Agostino, a dilapidated building, which is 
nevertheless a precious shrine of art. In no place can 
the works of Benozzo Gozzoli be studied so well as 
they can here. His masterpieces cover the walls of 
the choir, where, in 1465, he depicted the life of St. 
Augustine in seventeen compartments. Although 
wanting in some of the qualities which make a genius, 
Benozzo Gozzoli is an interesting painter and important 
in his time. He forms the link between the art of Fra 
Angelico and that of the Ghirlandaji and Pollajuoli. 

With the style and handling of Fra Angelico, 
without his spirituality, he possesses the power of 
portraiture and realism which is the distinctive mark 
of Ghirlandajo, without his more harmonious blending 
of colour and high relief. Of the Middle Ages he ig 



324 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

emphatically mediaeval, and his pictures make the city 
of San Gimignano complete. 

He supplies the figures to people the deserted 
streets. On these walls the very burghers, with their 
long-sleeved garments and their serious, business-like 
faces, who owned the towered houses, still live. There 
are the women, modestly shrouded in their wimples, 
who went to mass and to market centuries ago ; and 
there are the children — the boys in stiff little blouses, 
the girls in square-cut bodices — who went to school or 
played in the paved streets ; and there is the naughty 
boy, whom the irate schoolmaster is flogging with the 
greatest indignity — the poor child being hoisted on a 
big boy's back for the purpose. 

In linear perspective Benozzo is clever, although his 
aerial perspective is decidedly defective ; but his land- 
scapes are valuable as being almost the first attempts 
to depict still nature. He evidently loves every little 
plant that grows. As St. Augustine rides on to 
Milan his white palfrey treads daintily among the 
daisies and primroses ; a little poodle dog gambols in 
the ferny grass. 

In the scene where St. Augustine teaches the 
doctors of law, the intensity of expression and natural 



A SHRINE OF MEDIAEVAL ART. 325 

portraiture are delightful. There is the sneering 
lawyer, who evidently thinks the new lecturer very 
young and is sure he could fill the chair better himself ; 
there is the antagonistic one, who seems taking notes 
for argument ; and there are the earnest ones, who 
believe and listen dutifully. The sea-piece, where 
the ship bears the saint to Italy, is a charming bit of 
nature. The boat is of antique build, with double 
poop, richly carved. These frescoes were commissioned 
by one of the bygone celebrities of San Gimignano, 
a certain Fra Domenico Strambi, who won the name 
of Dottore Parigino, from having attained celebrity in 
Paris. Sebastiano Mainardi painted his portrait on 
the wall of the chancel arch, which has only been 
re-discovered under a coat of whitewash within the last 
thirty years. He is dressed in the robes of his order 
and lies on a monumental slab, with his hands raised 
in prayer. On the wall of the nave, opposite the 
principal entrance, is a very immense fresco by 
Benozzo Gozzoli — a St. Sebastian, which forms a 
curious pendant to the one in the Duomo. There, he 
is covered with arrows ; here, his martyrdom accom- 
plished, he has the power to ward off the sufferings of 
others. His cloak is held up by angels, and all the 



326 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

arrows sent from a group of angels in the celestial 
regions above are broken in its folds, and so remain 
harmless to the populace gathered beneath its shelter. 
It was painted as a votive offering after one of the 
many deliverances from the plague, which so often 
devastated San Gimignano — the plague being repre- 
sented as the arrows of vengeance from heaven. As 
usual, the most artistic part of the picture is the earthly 
group A crowd of expressive faces is gathered be- 
neath the wide mantle. Middle-aged men, with stern 
set features ; young girls, with gentle, modest faces ; and 
dear little chubby children, round-eyed and innocent. 

The church possesses one or two works by Tamagni, 
a native artist, who was a scholar of Raphael. He 
must have been the Burne Jones of his time, and had 
leanings towards a revival of older styles, for, with an 
advanced style of drawing, he has in his " Birth of the 
Virgin" mingled an affectation of colouring in the style 
of the earliest Florentines, and adorned his saints with 
the gold nimbus and gilded embroidery on their robes, 
as Bartolo di Fredi delighted to do. His "Christ and 
Saints " is much more free from these affectations, and 
has a depth of shadow and rich relief almost equal to 
Sodoma, but with less religious feeling. 



A SHRINE OF MEDIAEVAL ART. 327 

One of the gems of the church is the altar of St. 
Bartolo, the crippled youth who divides with Santa 
Fina the veneration of the people of San Gimignano. 
The altar is beautifully sculptured in marble by 
Benedetto da Maiano — some say it is by Settignano, 
however. The shrine is covered with rich decorative 
designs, and over the altar is a fine alto-relievo. 

The Church of S. Jacopo is even older than this. 
It was founded by the Knights Templars in the 
eleventh century, and has some very ancient frescoes. 
Monasticism, almost extinct in the more frequented 
parts of Italy, still flourishes amongst the other 
traditional institutions at San Gimignano. A great 
many friars and priests are to be seen in the streets : 
there are one hundred and twenty monks, in a 
population of less than two thousand. ^ The convent 
of St. Jerome, founded iioo, is still existing, and is a 
rich possession, the monks having some years ago 
discovered a copper mine beneath it. Other convents 
have suffered vicissitudes : that of Santa Chiara is a 
girls' school now, and that of the Dominicans has 
become a female penitentiary. The list of S. Gimig- 

^ Probably there are now fewer monks, as several convents have 
been suppressed since this was written. 



328 TUSCAN SKETCHES. 

nano worthies is a long one. There was Niccolo 
Pesciolini, sixteenth century, who rose to great 
diplomatic celebrity at the time of the Medici as 
ambassador in France ; and Curzio da Picchena, 
ambassador to Spain in the time of Ferdinand and 
Francis I. of Medici. He was a friend of Galileo, 
and wrote a translation and commentary on Tacitus. 
Tamagni, Mainardi, and Poccetti are the artists on 
whom the city prides herself. 

We will suggest to lovers of art who intend to 
explore San Gimignano that it would be well to supply 
themselves with tins of edibles in a portable form, for 
the living is, like everything else, extremely primitive. 
Returning to the dinner our hostess had promised us, 
we found it rather a disappointing meal. No butcher's 
meat was to be had, consequently no soup was forth- 
coming. The fish we had seen in the tub in the 
morning figured as the first course, cooked in oil ! The 
women called them "tinche," which we take to mean 
" tench," but they were of such a peculiarly muddy 
flavour as to be quite uneatable. They are fish caught 
in the marshes. Next our hostess talked greatly of a 
fine piece of mutton which she had obtained for us, 
but when it came it proved to be a few bones of kid 



A SHRINE OF MEDIEVAL ART. 329 

or goat's flesh, of impossible hardness and inexpressible 
flavour. The bread was black and hard, and the cheese 
harder. In the wine we did not recognize the excel- 
lence of which the poet Redi sings when speaking of 
the Val d' Elsa. But the good nature and hospitality 
of our hosts went far to atone for poor cheer, and the 
feast of mediaeval art at San Gimignano is so great as 
to banish more mundane realities from our minds. 



THE END. 



22 



^/ 



